Death and the Maiden

Egon Schiele lived with Walburga (Wally) Neuzil for four years — she was his model, muse, lover and companion. In 1915 he decided to marry Edith Harms, from a respectable middle-class Viennese family. He announced this decision to Wally over lunch, along with a proposal that they continue their sexual relationship on the side. Wally refused, walked out, and never saw him again. Schiele painted them separating: himself embracing her, her arms trapped between them, both faces frozen in the same shocked mask. Wally volunteered as a nurse in World War I and died of scarlet fever in 1917. Schiele died in the 1918 flu pandemic. Now at Belvedere, Vienna @belvederemuseum