He is best known today for his many prints, particularly a series entitled Paraphrase on the Finding of a Glove and his monumental sculptural installation in homage to Beethoven at the Vienna Secession in 1902.

Klinger shared a studio with Christian Krohg and the two had a mutual admiration for French naturalist authors like Émile Zola and Gustave Flaubert, who explored the shadowy aspects of urban life and the hypocrisy of society and the bourgeoisie in their novels.

[4] At that time realism was the prevailing style in Germany and Arnold Böcklin was one of the few artist active there that Klinger felt a close affinity to.

He was drawn to and studied the etchings and prints of many masters that were more aligned with his sensibilities including Dürer, Rembrandt, Goya, Runge, Menzel, and Rops.

He was achieving some notoriety with his pen and ink drawings and prints when in 1881 he published two sets of etchings, including Paraphrase on the Finding of a Glove, which was an immediate success and established his reputation.

After buying a villa in Florence, complete with 15,000 square meter park, recipients of the prize were given the opportunity to stay for a few months and adsorbed the culture of the city.

In 1911 Klinger left Asenijeff, when her mental health begin to show signs of deteriorating,[7] for an 18-year-old model, Gertrud Bock (1893–1932), who he ultimately married a few months before his death in 1920.

[7][9] Documentary photographs A significant portion of Klinger’s reputation is associated with his many cycles and series of intaglio prints, which influenced numerous printmakers and artist of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Klinger would adeptly integrate several intaglio media like aquatint, drypoint, and etching in a single plate, producing remarkable formal and tonal qualities.

In this case, the glove becomes a symbol for the artist's romantic yearnings, finding itself, in each plate, in different dramatic situations, and performing the role that we might expect the figure of the beloved herself to fulfill.

The plates suggest various psychological states or existential crises faced by the artist protagonist (who bears a striking resemblance to the young Klinger).

In Paris he started to draft his polemical text for Painting and Drawing,[10] which was eventually published in 1891, and subsequently reissued a number of times.

Even the normally shy and retiring Gustav Mahler was persuaded to transcribe music from Beethoven's Ninth Symphony for trumpets and rehearse the musicians for the opening.

The exhibition, presented within the specific architecture, with the sculpture, paintings, and music was in part, offered in the context of the Gesamtkunstwerk, comparative to a contemporary installation.

[13] The historian Holger Jacob-Friesen illustrates and discusses in detail the influence of Klinger's prints on artist such as Franz von Stuck, Käthe Kollwitz, Edvard Munch, Lovis Corinth, Otto Greiner, Alfred Kubin, Max Slevogt, Paul Klee, Richard Müller, Oskar Kokoschka, Max Beckmann, Horst Janssen, as well as De Chirico and Ernst.