Sitting Woman 1918

Egon Schiele made this drawing of a seated woman with ink on paper. It’s all about the line here, right? The line moves confidently to create an empathetic portrait with a sense of openness. See how the line thickens and thins, how the pressure varies? It’s almost sculptural, how he uses the line to suggest form. The paper peeks through, becoming a kind of luminous ground. Schiele is like a masterclass in how much you can do with so little. The blank areas feel charged and full of potential; you feel like you could just dive right in and start painting! I think he’s in dialogue with artists like Klimt, but he’s stripped away the decoration. He’s embracing a kind of raw honesty, which is something I try to do in my own work. Art’s all about this ongoing conversation, isn’t it? We’re all just trying to figure things out, one line at a time.