Austrian Expressionism
An exciting period in the art history is Austrian Expressionism.
“Expressionism in Austria is principally represented by two major figures: Oskar Kokoschka and Egon Schiele. Although they were essentially rivals, they both concentrated on portraiture and the nude, using sexually or psychologically charged body language to bore into the human psyche and challenge the facade of complacency and conformity that dominated Viennese culture.”
In a brief life cut short by the Spanish flu, Egon Schiele (1890–1918) managed to create an oeuvre that was both symptomatic of and groundbreaking for his times, making him one of the most formative and colorful figures of Viennese Modernism.
Schiele stylized himself in his works and letters as a sage and clairvoyant, as a conduit with an intense sense of reality and truth. Using eccentric gestures and facial expressions, he conveyed the urgency of relentlessly interrogating the body and postulated self-reflection as a quasi-blending of corporeality and sexuality with existential questions.