Double Self Portrait 1915

Egon Schiele made this “Double Self Portrait” with pencil and watercolor, and honestly, it looks like he was working through some stuff. The lines are raw, almost like he's scratching into the paper, trying to get something out. The colors are these flushed, feverish tones, especially around the eyes and lips of the bottom figure. I mean, look at those eyes! It's intense, right? The way he's staring out at you, it’s confrontational. And the pose, with one head resting on the other, it's like he’s wrestling with himself. Schiele was so good at using his materials to convey inner turmoil. You can see echoes of Edvard Munch in that kind of emotional directness, that rawness. But what I find so compelling is how he leaves so much unsaid, undefined. It’s this space between the lines, the ambiguity, that really lets your imagination take over. It's like he's saying, "Here's a feeling, now you figure it out."