Svitlana Shiells’ monograph Gustav Klimt and Japanese Art in Fin-de-Siècle Vienna: Deciphering Klimt’s Stylistic Evolution was published in March 2026 by Routledge. Focusing on Klimt’s engagement with Japanese art, Shiells documents that the artist not only collected Japanese art but diligently and continuously studied these materials as a scholar. Hence, from the 1890s onward, Klimt became seriously interested in the art of Hokusai, Hiroshige, Utamaro, Jakuchū, Kunisada, Kuniyoshi, and others. She also investigates how shunga and bijin-ga shaped the deeply entrenched eroticism of Klimt’s art. Significantly, the book demonstrates that adopting certain compositional blueprints, Klimt invariably adapted them to his ends, and in the process transformed them to such a degree that it is difficult to recognize them. Gradually, the artist developed his own Symbolist language, influenced by Western and Eastern (including Shinto) sources.
Shiells’ book widens and deepens scholarly understanding of the environment in which the artist operated.While Klimt’s artistic pendulum inexorably oscillated between East and West, Shiells demonstrates that any rigorous analysis of Klimt’s oeuvre must account for the centrality of Japanese art within his creative trajectory.
- date: Thursday, September 24th, 2026, 18:00
- venue: Department of East Asian Studies/Japanese Studies, seminar room 1
- online via Zoom: univienna.zoom.us/j/64024075342 (Meeting-ID: 640 2407 5342 / Code: 174768)
Dr. Svitlana Shiells, a former professor of art history, has taught at universities in Ukraine, America, and Austria. She completed her studies, including a Ph.D. in art history, in Ukraine. The focus of her research is Japonisme in Eastern and Central European modern art. Shiells has published widely and has presented her research at Harvard University, Tokyo University of the Arts, the College Art Association, and various other universities and museums worldwide. Her recent book is one of the most comprehensive monographs to date on Klimt’s oeuvre.
