Lesende

Egon Schiele created many drawings with highly charged sexual imagery, but much of his output is full of tenderness. He made this delicate drawing while lodging with Johann Gierlinger, a blacksmith living just outside Vienna, Austria. Gierlinger’s daughter, Mitzi, recalled that Schiele drew her many times as they sat in the courtyard of the house. This and several other surviving drawings show her wearing her hair up, as was the fashion. In some places Schiele’s line is absolutely confident, like the back of Mitzi’s neck and back, and in others it looks searching, tentative, retraced, as in her hair. Mitzi might seem to be peacefully lost in her thoughts, but the clawlike grip of her firmly drawn fingers may communicate some tension.