Klimt / Schiele

Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) and his younger protégé Egon Schiele (1890-1918) are considered two of the greatest figures of Austrian Modernism. Whether competing with or inspiring one another, together they reconfigured the way the human body was translated into art. Although both artists are primarily remembered as painters, between them they left 7,000 drawings, many of the greatest of which are now in the collection of the Albertina Museum, Vienna.

In 2018 an exhibition opens in London of both artists’ drawings from the Albertina. This stunning publication records these precious works, which are very rarely displayed and almost never travel, in all their erotic, intriguing and sometimes disturbing beauty. Leading experts on the period provide authoritative texts that illuminate the important relationship between the two artists. They analyse the role of drawing in their practice and chart the response of early twentieth-century Vienna to their electrifying work, which still has the power to shock and enthral to this day.

1/ Egon Schiele, Nude Self-portrait, Squatting, 1916. Graphite and gouache on brown packing paper, 29.5 x 45.8 cm. The Albertina Museum, Vienna
2/ Gustav Klimt, Standing Female Nude (Study for The Three Gorgons; Beethoven Frieze), 1901. Black chalk on brown packing paper, 44.5 x 31.9 cm. The Albertina Museum, Vienna
3/ Egon Schiele, Female Nude, 1910. Graphite, black chalk, watercolour and white and coloured gouaches on brown packing paper, 44 x 30.5 cm. The Albertina Museum, Vienna