A previously unknown plaster relief by Austrian Art Nouveau painter Gustav Klimt has been discovered in a Budapest apartment.
The Klimt relief, advertising Vienna piano manufacture Ehrbar, was made of plaster and hand-painted in gold, between 1890 and 1892. It was found in a downtown Budapest apartment which previously functioned as a piano salon.
According to Rmx.news, architect and interior designer György Selmeczi made the discovery after it had been hanging on the same wall for over a century. Selmeczi said that the relief was probably commissioned by the Austrian piano maker's Hungarian distributor for the 1896 celebrations of 1,000 years of Hungary's foundation.
Experts believe the relief was designed by Gustav Klimt and made by one of his brothers, either Georg or Ernst. It has many distinctive elements of Klimt's art - such as wave lines, a laurel wreath and a lyre - and finished in gold, which became the hallmark of Klimt's subsequent creations. It also closely resembles a later Klimt work, the so-called Beethoven frieze.