Gustav Klimt:
Transfer Sketch for the Faculty Painting Philosophie (Übertragungsskizze zum Fakultätsbild Philosophie), 1899
Black chalk and graphite on paper
89.6 × 63.2 cm
©Wien Museum, Vienna
(Strobl 477)

To really understand this sketch, you have to look at three things: how Klimt actually worked, the massive scale of the final painting, and the tragic way the whole project ended. In her standard catalogue of Klimt’s drawings, Alice Strobl explains under entry Strobl 477 exactly how Klimt used a Vergrößerungsnetz—an enlargement grid—to bring his ideas to life. This grid allowed him to blow up his initial drawings to a monumental scale of about 430 × 300 cm without losing the right proportions. Look closely under the black chalk and pencil lines, and you can still see the faint geometric grid lines. It shows that behind Klimt’s free, flowing style, there was a very practical and disciplined mathematical system.

The background story is famous. Klimt was commissioned to paint three massive artworks—Philosophie, Medizin, and Jurisprudenz—for the ceiling of the Great Hall at the University of Vienna. The university expected traditional, uplifting art that celebrated science and human reason. Instead, Klimt delivered something dark, atmospheric, and deeply psychological. In this specific sketch for Philosophie, Klimt uses a dramatic worm’s-eye view. He pushes the Weltgeheimnis (the mysterious Sphinx) into a huge, dominant position in the background, while cutting off the figure of Das Wissen (Knowledge) abruptly at the very bottom. Instead of a reassuring message about academic success, Klimt showed humanity drifting through a dark, cosmic void, helpless against fate and time. The university professors were furious, calling the work ugly and completely inappropriate. The scandal was a major turning point: Klimt walked away from government commissions forever, returned his advance money, and demanded absolute artistic freedom.

The story ends in tragedy. In May 1945, during the final days of World War II, all three Faculty Paintings were destroyed. They had been stored at Schloss Immendorf in Lower Austria to protect them from air raids. When retreating German troops set the castle on fire, Klimt’s masterpieces were completely lost. Today, we only have black-and-white photos and a few preparatory drawings. This sheet at the Wien Museum is a rare, surviving witness to the exact moment Klimt changed the rules of modern art—backed by a practical grid system that made his grand vision possible, but forever linked to a masterpiece we can no longer see.