Gustav Klimt’s long-lost portrait of an African prince has resurfaced after nearly a century. The painting, which depicts Prince William Nii Nortey Dowuona of the Ga people in modern-day Ghana, is now on display at the Wienerroither & Kohlbacher Gallery in Vienna. It carries a price tag of €15 million.
Klimt painted the portrait in 1897 after encountering Prince Dowuona at the Völkerschau, a late-colonial event that showcased ethnographic displays from colonized peoples at an urban zoo in Vienna. The prince was one of 120 Ga people who traveled by steamship to Austria for the event. The painting was sold from Klimt’s estate in 1923 and was last seen in 1928 when it was acquired by the Klein family, a wealthy Austrian Jewish family, for an exhibition.
Klimt’s rediscovered African prince portrait
The Kleins converted Klimt’s studio into a villa but were forced to abandon their property and flee to Monaco in 1938 due to growing anti-Semitism in Austria. Alfred Weidinger, an art historian who had been searching for the work for two decades, authenticated the painting with the help of a faded stamp on the back of the canvas.
He noted that the composition and painterly execution of the portrait point to Klimt’s turn towards decorative elements, which would characterize his later work. Klimt’s works have fetched eight-figure sums at auction houses, with one painting of an unknown woman holding a fan selling for $108 million. There are currently no plans to auction the portrait of Prince Dowuona.
The rediscovery of this significant artwork has generated excitement within the art community, promising to add a rich chapter to the existing narrative of Klimt’s oeuvre. The portrait captures the prince with dignity and warmth, set against a vibrant floral background that embodies Klimt’s distinctive, symbolic style.
Photo by; Anthony Gucciardi on Unsplash
