Standing Nude Girl, Facing Left

Standing Nude Girl, Facing Left by Egon Schiele is an intense charcoal on paper drawing executed in 1918, the final year of the artist’s life. This powerful work exemplifies Schiele’s mastery of the figure, capturing the subject, a young woman, in an assertive yet vulnerable stance. The intense focus on female nudes allowed the artist to explore themes of psychological exposure and corporal experience that defined Viennese Expressionism.

Schiele utilizes the inherent immediacy of charcoal to define the figure's contours with rapid, nervous energy. The subject stands in a direct, unidealized frontal pose, yet turns her head sharply to the left, creating a sense of tension and avoidance that is characteristic of the artist's mature style. The drawing is remarkably spare; there is no environment or background detail, concentrating all visual power solely on the figure and the dynamic qualities of the line work.

Created amid the final collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Schiele’s drawings reflect the era’s pervasive anxiety and focus on the internal psychological landscape. This sensitive depiction is one of the last figure studies the artist completed before his untimely death during the influenza pandemic. Today, this important drawing is housed in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where it serves as a crucial document of early 20th-century Austrian art. Given its cultural significance, high-quality digital representations and related prints of Schiele's works are frequently available in the public domain for study and appreciation.