Egon Schiele:
Two Female Nudes by the Water (Zwei weibliche Akte am Wasser) (1912)
Watercolor and pencil on paper
47.8 × 31.5 cm
(Kallir d1111)
Private Collection

This drawing places us before two women seated in close proximity, their bodies elongated and stylized in Schiele’s unmistakable hand. The sharp, probing pencil line defines their forms, while watercolor washes lend a fragile vitality. The figure with light hair and a blue headscarf may be Valerie (Wally) Neuzil, Schiele’s companion and frequent model, as noted by Jane Kallir in her catalogue raisonné.

Though the title suggests the water’s edge, other works from the series hint that the women may instead be resting on a blanket. Schiele leaves the setting unresolved: faint touches of blue and green could indicate water, ground, or fabric. What matters is not the landscape but the intimacy of the figures — their quiet tension, their shared presence, and the subtle bond that ties them together.

Created in 1912, the drawing belongs to a formative moment in Schiele’s career, when he moved beyond academic convention toward a more personal, psychologically charged vision of the human figure. Its place in a private collection underscores the rarity of direct encounters with such works, most often known today through reproductions. Each glimpse of the original carries the weight of that distance, making the drawing feel all the more significant.