Marie Czihaczek, untitled

Marie Leopoldine Czihaczek (1853–1937), the sister of Adolf Schiele (1851–1905), was married to Leopold Czihaczek (1842–1929), a senior inspector of the North Railway. Referred to as a “woman with a cheerful disposition” by a family friend, she and her husband enjoyed a solid middle-class lifestyle in a beautiful Viennese “apartment with a large music room and two pianos on Zirkusgasse; in the summer, they rented a villa on the outskirts of Vienna, had a box at the Burgtheater, etc.” (cf. Leopold and Marie Czihaczek Sitting at the Piano. The photograph shows Marie Czihaczek either in her apartment, or at another location but imitating her home’s “gathered silk curtains”, sitting on a chair with a slightly pensive expression, and holding a lorgnon in her right hand, as if she had just been reading. In another photograph, she appears in the same place alongside her husband.

KJ, 2024