Portrait of Daughter Sylvia, 1918

When the painter Broncia Koller-Pinell (1863–1934) settled permanently in Vienna, she managed to make a name for herself in the circles of Viennese Modernism. This network provided her not only with inspiration for her art but also gave her the opportunity to participate in exhibitions and to join various associations, for instance the Secession and the Kunstschau Group. Together with her husband, the physicist and physician Hugo Koller (1867–1949), she acted as a patron and also encouraged her children Rupert (1896–1976) and Silvia Koller (1898–1966) with their artistic endeavors. The emerging artist Silvia (or Sylvia) was accepted into the Vienna School of Arts and Crafts in 1915. In her diary, she remembered her teacher Egon Schiele (1890–1918), who in 1918, during the last year of his life, gave her private painting lessons. She frequently modeled for her mother, for instance for Portrait of Silvia Koller. In the 1918 Portrait of Daughter Sylvia the depicted, portrayed two times, looks directly at beholders with her dark eyes.

RR, 2023