Yves Klein was born in Nice, France on April 28, 1928. He was self-taught in art. He served in the French army while stationed in Germany. In 1962 he married Rotraut Uecker and they had a son, Yves, who was raised by his mother after his father's untimely death in 1962. Klein had traveled widely, living in Japan in 1952 and 1953, earning a black belt in judo.

Throughout the centuries artists have used models in assorted ways, but no one has ever used them in quite the manner of Parisian painter Yves Klein. He had his nude models smear themselves with paint, then let them hurl themselves at a blank canvas while he shouted direction from a stepladder. He found that working with brushes was too...