Beloved Muse – Emilie Flöge by Penny Black.
Directed by Heidelinde Leutgoeb. Music Georg Buxhofer. Lighting Jed Buchanan. Stage management William Malam. Produced by Belvedere. Supported by the Austrian Embassy Canberra. Street Two. The Street Theatre, September 13-16. 2018
Reviewed by Peter Wilkins
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| Gustav Klimt and Emilie Flöge in her original strip[ed dress |
Who amongst the art lovers of the
world has not heard of Gustav Klimt, the charismatic leader of Vienna’s Secession
Movement of the early twentieth Century? Who is not familiar with his iconic
portrait in glittering gold of a man and woman in an intimate embrace? Many may consider the man in the famous
portrait of The Kiss to be a self
portrait. But what of the model? What does the viewer know of the model and muse
in the painting?
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| Maxi Blaha as Emilie Flöge |
Enter Viennese actress, Maxi
Blaha, a vision of elegant composure,
statuesque in her diaphanous dress, autocratic with her hair piled high in
fashionable style, gracefully moving across the patterned carpet to sit on the
low wooden bench. Alongside her,
musician Georg Buxhofer on electric bass punctuates her solo performance with accompanying chords.
Blaha is the ideal vision of
Klimt’s model, muse and intellectual partner of twenty seven years, Emilie Flöge.
And yet, how many people know of her
life, as extraordinary as that of her famous artist. For a thoroughly absorbing
hour, Blaha introduces us to the chapters of Flöge’s life and the enormous
influence she had on Klimt’s work as well as the Viennese haute couture fashion
and lifestyle.
From the outset we are introduced
to a woman of strong character, an independent woman, in business with her
sisters at their dress salon, Sisters Flöge
on the fashionable Mariahilferstrasse. Playwright Penny Black leads us on a
chronological journey through key episodes in this remarkable woman’s life. Flöge’s
story commences at the time of Klimt’s death in February 1918. It is said that
Klimt’s final words were “Get Emilie” or “Emilie must come” But Flöge is no
lapdog to succumb to a master’s demanding call. She is a woman of independent
means and independent will, a partner, who would provide dresses for Klimt’s
models while he would send his clients to Flöge’s salon to buy clothes that
cost the price of a small house on Lake Attersee, disbanded of corsets and
inspired the fashions of Coco Chanel.
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| The Kiss by Gustav Klimt |
Beloved Muse – Emilie Flöge reveals a feminist of strong
convictions, confronting and challenging convention. Blaha presents a woman,
capable of jealousy, loyal and devoted, resourceful and strongly opinionated.
She criticizes Klimt’s misogynistic view of the lovers in The Kiss with the woman in a
suppliant pose while the dominant male figure hovers over her. Blaha invites
the audience to look beyond the image to glean a deeper meaning in a
performance that is as thought provoking as it is illuminating and
entertaining.
This gentle gem of a show suffers
no ostentation. Revelations of the disastrous events of the Great Depression,
the Second World War and the tragic destruction of Flöge’s costumes and Klimt’s
sketches in a bombed house in Vienna are told with simple sentiment, all the
more dramatic for their philosophical acceptance of life’s misfortunes.
Buxhofer’s musical accompaniment and Blaha’s removal of the reversible dress,
made with eighteen metres of material to reveal a simple black slip reveals a
woman of our time and all time, a woman, customarily depicted as a victim of
the stereotype and yet, through Black’s one woman play and Blaha’s measured and
intimate performance , revealed as an icon in her own right, a modern role
model for all women of all time. Klimt’s muse is the muse for all society, and
Maxi Blaha the perfect woman to bring Emilie Flöge to the world.