Egon Schiele's 100 Essential Pictorial Works

His own body offered him an always available model and a field of experimentation. He uses gestures, grimaces, nudity and duplication to question identity rather than to fix an advantageous image of himself.

Klimt supported the young Schiele, introduced him to collectors and remained an important model. Schiele took up certain formats, poses and themes, but developed a drier line and a more fragmented representation of the body in 1910.

Yes. Watercolor, gouache, pencil, charcoal and covering color allow him to combine line speed, paper reserve and chromatic accents. They are not simple preparations: many are among his most accomplished works.

Shortcuts, angles and disproportions are expressive choices. They make visible the weight, tension, vulnerability or isolation of a pose that anatomical accuracy alone would not be enough to convey.

Českÿ Krumlov, then called Krumau, is his mother's hometown. Schiele often painted it from the heights, tightening the houses in the loop of the Vltava until transforming the topography into an image of solitude and memory.

Painted in 1915, it transposes the separation of Schiele and Wally Neuzil into a great allegory. The embrace, the funerary floor and the distance of the faces bring together biographical experience and universal scope.

The line often becomes more flexible, the volumes fuller and the portraits more naturalistic. The large compositions of couples, mothers and families, however, show that his themes of presence, relationship and finitude remain.

The Leopold Museum and the Belvedere in Vienna preserve the major ensembles. The Albertina has essential sheets; other important works can be found notably in The Hague, Stuttgart, New York and in private collections.