Egon Schiele

Egon Schiele – Early death of his father; studies with Christian Griepenkerl

Egon Schiele was born on 12 June 1890 in Tulln an der Donau. He was the only son of the Tulln stationmaster Adolf Schiele and spent his childhood with two elder and one younger sister in the company apartment in Tulln train station. He had a limited interest in school, and his application was accordingly modest but showed a keen enthusiasm for the fine arts from early on, drawing whenever he could, with his youngest sister Gertrude often serving as model. The untimely death of his father from syphilis brought Egon Schiele under the guardianship of his uncle Leopold Czihaczek. Because of his continued failure in school and his ever-increasing artistic talent, the artist Max Kahrer and teacher Ludwig Karl Strauch arranged for Schiele to attend the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. Following heated arguments with his conservative uncle, for whom the career aspirations as draughtsman and painter seemed barely admissible, the young artist was finally permitted to attend Christian Griepenkerl’s painting class in Vienna.

Patronage by Gustav Klimt; relationship with Wally Neuzil

Egon Schiele did not get on with the rigid structure at the academy and soon founded the Viennese Neukunstgruppe together with like-minded colleagues. The contact with Gustav Klimt proved especially significant, who stood as a fatherly friend and patron, and it was also early works in Klimt’s style that brought Schiele his first success as a painter. The art critic Arthur Roessler became aware of the young artist and facilitated important acquaintanceships such as the wealthy industrialist and art collector Carl Reininghaus, whose commissions gave Schiele financial security. Dialogue with Max Oppenheimer brought about further stylistic development away from the decorative Art Nouveau style represented up till then. The artist clashed with the public in Neulengbach, when they took offence at his casual collaboration with Wally Neuzil, who posed for him naked in the open air. The accusations culminated in a charge of kidnapping and abuse of a minor. However, after three weeks in custody, the artist was eventually released. His famous picture Tod und Mädchen shows Egon Schiele and Wally Neuzil.

Great painterly success; early dearh from the Spanish flu

Egon Schiele had above all Gustav Klimt to thank that he was accepted back into the Viennese art world after these reputation-damaging events, with the industrialist August Lederer becoming one of his most important collectors. Schiele experimented as an author a few times, publishing literary and theoretical texts in the left-wing Berlin journal Die Aktion. In his private life, his marriage to Edith Harms forced the break with his long-term lover Wally Neuzil, as both women rejected the artist’s suggestion of a love triangle. Schiele served as a war painter during the First World War and, together with Albert Paris Gütersloh, was responsible for the design of the 1917 war exhibition in the Vienna Prater. He succeeded Gustav Klimt following the mentor’s death and finally rose to the top of the Viennese art scene. 

Egon Schiele died on 31 October 1918 in Vienna, succumbing to the Spanish flu, just like his pregnant wife Edith a few days before.