What the painting shows

The Large Poplar I by Klimt presents a towering poplar tree rising over an open green meadow. Klimt completed the work in 1900 using oil on canvas, balancing the tall tree against a wide horizon. The massive, dark green column of leaves commands the left side of the composition and reaches almost to the upper edge of the canvas.

Underneath the primary tree, smaller saplings stand spaced across the field. A blanket of bright green grass spreads forward, dotted with small white field flowers. Soft white and gray clouds drift across the sky behind the branches, broken by small patches of clear blue near the top.

Klimt applied the paint with dense, textured strokes that give the foliage a stippled surface. Dark shadows gather at the base of the trunk and along the tree line in the background, anchoring the upright poplar within the open landscape.

The story behind it

Klimt painted The Large Poplar I in 1900. The work belongs to his focus on landscapes, which highlighted rural scenes and natural foliage without human figures. It measures 81.3 by 80.3 centimeters, using a nearly square canvas that draws equal attention to the vertical tree and the horizontal ground. You can view where this artwork fits in his career through our catalog of Gustav Klimt paintings.

Where to see it

You can see The Large Poplar I at the Neue Galerie in New York. The museum keeps the 1900 oil painting in its public collection, where you can observe its brushwork and composition in person.