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ONLINECOLLECTION

Krumau on the Vltava (The Small Town IV), 1914

Leopold Museum,
Vienna
Oil, black chalk on canvas
99.5×120.5 cm

Artists

  • Egon Schiele

    (Tulln 1890–1918 Vienna)

Unfortunately not on display at the moment
The painting Krumau on the Vltava (The Small Town IV) is considered a prime example of the flat composition style that can be observed in Egon Schiele’s (1890–1918) oeuvre from 1913. From an extreme top view, he captures the landscape of houses opposite the Schlossberg hill in Krumau and subjects it to a schematic composition organized along horizontal and vertical lines. With regard to coloration, he resumes the diversity of colors seen in The Small Town III, 1913, letting the facades and windows below the brown-glazed roofs shine in partially purely imaginary, sunny shades of yellow, blue and white. During the relining of the painting in the 1960s, Rudolf Leopold (1925–2010) discovered that Schiele’s presumably lost painting Melancholia – a nude self-portrait combined with a view of Krumau created in 1910 – is hidden below the horizontal city landscape. It is not known why Schiele decided to paint over the work, thus destroying it.

Object data

Artist/author
  • Egon Schiele
Title
Krumau on the Vltava (The Small Town IV)
Date
1914
Art movement
Expressionism
Category
Painting
Material​/technique
Oil, black chalk on canvas
Dimensions
99.5×120.5 cm
Signature
Signed and dated lower right using black chalk: EGON SCHIELE 1914
Credit line
Leopold Museum, Vienna, Inv. 655
Inventory access
Contributed to the Leopold Museum-Privatstiftung in 1994
Selection of Reference works
  • Hundertwasser - Schiele. Imagine Tomorrow, hrsg. von Hans-Peter Wipplinger, Köln 2020 (Leopold Museum, Wien, 21.02.2020-31.08.2020).
  • Rudolf Leopold: Egon Schiele. Gemälde, Aquarelle, Zeichnungen, hrsg. von Elisabeth Leopold, München 2020.
  • Tobias Natter: Egon Schiele, Sämtliche Gemälde 1909-1918, Köln 2017.
  • Egon Schiele Landschaften, hrsg. von Rudolf Leopold, München u.a. 2004 (Ausst. Kat. Leopold Museum, Wien, 17.09.2004-31.01.2005).
  • Jane Kallir: Egon Schiele - The complete works. Expanded edition including a biography and a catalogue raisonné, New York 1998.
  • Otto Kallir: Egon Schiele. Oeuvre Catalogue of the Paintings, New York 1966.
  • Otto Nirenstein: Egon Schiele. Persönlichkeit und Werk, Berlin 1930.
Catalogue raisonne
  • J. Kallir 1990/1998: P278
  • Leopold 1972/2020: 244
  • Natter 2017: 153
  • O. Kallir 1966: 196 / XXXVI
  • O. Kallir (Nirenstein) 1930: 144 / XXXI
Keywords

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Provenance

Provenance research
Leopold Museum i

Maria Hora, Wien (1914-1949); (1)
Brigitte Grill geb. Hora, Wien (o.D.);
Dr. Rudolf Leopold, Wien (1959-1994); (2)
Leopold Museum-Privatstiftung, Wien (1994).

  1. Sonja Niederacher, Egon Schiele. Krumau an der Moldau, Dossier vom 30.04.2011; Otto Nirenstein, Egon Schiele. Persönlichkeit und Werk, Berlin 1930, Nr.144; Österreichische Galerie Belvedere, Archiv Neue Galerie 4255/48, Katalog zu „Egon Schiele. Gedächtnisausstellung zum 30. Todestag, Oktober–November 1948“, Nr. 39.
  2. Archiv des Leopold Museums, Kaufvertrag vom 28.05.1959 (Abschrift eines Stenogramms)

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