Just years after critics branded his University of Vienna ceiling paintings as perverted excess and 87 faculty members petitioned against them, Gustav Klimt unveiled a canvas the Austrian government bought before it was even finished. This episode explores how that reversal happened, from Klimt taking out a loan to buy back his own paintings and walk away from state patronage, to his defiant philosophy of moving a select few rather than pleasing everyone, and the embracing couples he workshopped in the Beethoven Frieze and the Stoclet Frieze.

We examine the 71-by-71-inch square of The Kiss, originally titled Liebespaar, in detail: the meadow that drops away beneath the woman's feet, the hidden face of the man, the geometric versus floral robes, the tight Japanese-influenced cropping, and the tension between realistic flesh and flat decorati ...