Gustav Klimt Hope, II 1907-08

  • MoMA, Floor 5, 504 The Alfred H. Barr, Jr. Galleries

A pregnant woman bows her head and closes her eyes, as if praying for the safety of her child. Peeping out from behind her stomach is a death’s head, a looming sign of the danger she faces. At her feet, three women with lowered heads raise their hands, presumably also in prayer—although their solemnity might also imply mourning, as if they foresaw the child’s fate. Why, then, the painting’s title? Klimt himself called this work Vision, although he had titled an earlier, related painting of a pregnant woman Hope. By association with the earlier work, this one has become known as Hope, II.

Klimt was among the many European artists of his time who were inspired by cultural traditions from outside their own milieu. He lived in Vienna, a crossroads of East and West, and he drew on sources such as Byzantine art, Mycenaean metalwork, Persian rugs and miniatures, the mosaics of the Ravenna churches, and Japanese screens. In this painting, the woman’s gold-patterned robe—drawn flat, as clothing is in Russian icons, although her flesh is rounded and dimensional—has an extraordinary decorative beauty. Here birth, death, and the sensuality of the living exist side by side, suspended in equilibrium.

Publication excerpt from MoMA Highlights: 375 Works from The Museum of Modern Art, New York (New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2019)
Additional text

Although images of women and children are frequent in the history of art, depictions of pregnancy are rare. In Hope, II a woman with a skull nestled into her gown lowers her head toward her swelling belly. Below, three women also bow their heads in prayer or in mourning. Ornate decoration nearly overwhelms the painting’s surface. Klimt was committed to craftwork, and he was among the many artists of his time who combined archaic traditions—here Byzantine gold-leaf painting—with a modern psychological subject. Klimt lived and worked in turn-of-the-century Vienna, home to Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis; the artist’s preoccupation with formative drives like sex and death paralleled Freud’s explorations of the psyche.

Gallery label from 2019
Medium
Oil, gold, and platinum on canvas
Dimensions
43 1/2 x 43 1/2" (110.5 x 110.5 cm)
Credit
Jo Carole and Ronald S. Lauder and Helen Acheson Funds, and Serge Sabarsky
Object number
468.1978
Department
Painting and Sculpture

Installation views

We have identified these works in the following photos from our exhibition history.

How we identified these works

In 2018–19, MoMA collaborated with Google Arts & Culture Lab on a project using machine learning to identify artworks in installation photos. That project has concluded, and works are now being identified by MoMA staff.

If you notice an error, please contact us at [email protected].

Provenance Research Project

This work is included in the Provenance Research Project, which investigates the ownership history of works in MoMA's collection.

The artist
Eugenia Primavesi
Neue Galerie, Vienna (unconfirmed whether owned or on consignment. Per exhibition files Gustav Klimt Gedächtnisausstellung, Wiener Secession 1928)
Hugo Bernatzik (Per Archiv Neue Galerie at Belvedere, Vienna 1935)
Heirs of the above
Dr. Hans Barnas, Vienna
1978 The Museum of Modern Art, New York (Acquired from the above through Galerie Beyeler, Basel)

Provenance research is a work in progress, and is frequently updated with new information. If you have any questions or information to provide about the listed works, please email [email protected] or write to:

Provenance Research Project
The Museum of Modern Art
11 West 53 Street
New York, NY 10019

Licensing

If you would like to reproduce an image of a work of art in MoMA’s collection, or an image of a MoMA publication or archival material (including installation views, checklists, and press releases), please contact Art Resource (publication in North America) or Scala Archives (publication in all other geographic locations).

MoMA licenses archival audio and select out of copyright film clips from our film collection. At this time, MoMA produced video cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. All requests to license archival audio or out of copyright film clips should be addressed to Scala Archives at [email protected]. Motion picture film stills cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. For access to motion picture film stills for research purposes, please contact the Film Study Center at [email protected]. For more information about film loans and our Circulating Film and Video Library, please visit https://www.moma.org/research/circulating-film.

If you would like to reproduce text from a MoMA publication, please email [email protected]. If you would like to publish text from MoMA’s archival materials, please fill out this permission form and send to [email protected].

Feedback

This record is a work in progress. If you have additional information or spotted an error, please send feedback to [email protected].