Description
Portrait of Leopold Czihaczek is Egon Schiele’s portrait of his uncle and guardian, painted in 1907 in tempera on cardboard: a white-haired man with a moustache and pointed beard, in a high white collar, red tie and dark jacket. The original is in the Wien Museum in Vienna. We paint it by hand in oils on canvas at the size you choose, and before dispatch we send you a photograph of the finished work for approval.
| Title: | Portrait of Leopold Czihaczek |
| Other titles: | Porträt Leopold Czihaczek |
| Painter: | Egon Schiele (1890–1918) |
| Year: | 1907, signed middle right “SCHIELE” |
| Original size: | 32 cm x 39.9 cm (height x width) |
| Original technique: | Tempera on cardboard |
| Style: | Early work (Academy years) |
| Location: | Wien Museum, Vienna (inv. 304970) |
| Our reproduction: | hand-painted oil on canvas, 10 sizes from 40 x 32 cm to 160 x 128 cm, or a made-to-measure size |
Portrait of Leopold Czihaczek – Egon Schiele
What does the painting show?
An older man seen to the chest, his head turned a little to the right. His hair is thick and white, brushed up from the forehead; he has a white moustache and a short pointed beard, and the face is built from pinks and ochres with blue-grey shadows round the eyes. He wears a high white collar, a red patterned tie and a dark jacket laid on in broad, loose strokes. Behind him the ground is a brushed blue-grey, and along the left side and the edges the brown cardboard is left bare. At the right, in dark red capitals, runs the signature SCHIELE. The sitter is Leopold Czihaczek (1842–1929), a senior railway official and the Austrian painter’s uncle, who became his guardian after the death of Schiele’s father.
Why do people love it?
Because it shows Schiele before the style he is known for. The face is carefully modelled, while the jacket is sketched in a few quick strokes and part of the board is left bare, so you can see the work being made. The white head against the dark coat gives a strong, simple contrast that reads from across a room. And it is a family portrait: the man who took the young Schiele in when he came to Vienna in 1906 to study at the Academy of Fine Arts, painted by his nephew a year later.
Where does it sit among Schiele’s works?
At the very beginning. Jane Kallir’s catalogue of the complete works lists it as P 3b, among the earliest paintings. Schiele portrayed his uncle several times in 1907 and 1908, so more than one portrait of Czihaczek exists; this one is the tempera on cardboard in the Wien Museum. Within a few years his portraits changed completely, as Portrait of Eduard Kosmack of 1910, Trude Engel and Portrait of Paris von Gütersloh of 1918, the year of his death, show. The full selection is in the Egon Schiele gallery, and there is more on his life in our article about Egon Schiele.
How is our hand-painted version made?
Each copy is a hand-painted painting made for your order, not a print: a painter works the canvas in oils, stroke by stroke. The original is tempera on cardboard, ours is oil on canvas; the two materials behave differently, and we do not present them as the same. What matters most here is the contrast between the carefully modelled face and the loose strokes of the jacket, and the bare brown ground at the edges, which belongs to the composition. When the work is finished we photograph it and send you the photograph for approval, and only then does it ship. We have not yet photographed this work in our workshop; photographs will be added to this page once we have them.
Which size for which wall?
The original is small, 32 x 39.9 cm, and our smallest size, 40 x 32 cm, is almost exactly its size. Above a desk or a chest of drawers, 47 x 38 cm or 65 x 52 cm work well; above a sofa or a sideboard in a living room, 85 x 68 cm or 100 x 80 cm; on a large wall or in a tall room, 125 x 100 cm up to 160 x 128 cm. At the larger sizes a canvas painting like this portrait gains from some distance, because the quick strokes of the coat only settle into a figure from a few steps back. Hang it with the centre at eye level, about 145–150 cm from the floor.
Custom size, stretcher bar and frame
If none of the ten sizes suits your wall, we paint the work to your own measurement. If you choose YES under the Podokvir (stretcher bar) option, the canvas comes stretched on a wooden stretcher bar, ready to hang. Our 3D application is for choosing a frame only. The frame is chosen separately and need not be part of the order.
Delivery and guarantee
We paint to order and deliver to sixteen countries in the European Union, among them Slovenia, Croatia, Austria, Italy, Hungary, Germany and France; the United Kingdom and Ireland are not currently among them. The work arrives protectively packed and, if you chose YES under Podokvir, stretched on a stretcher bar. Before dispatch we send you a photograph of the finished work to approve. Production time depends on the size and on the studio’s workload. Every order is covered by our Returns and Refund Policy.
Frequently asked questions
Who is the man in the portrait?
Leopold Czihaczek (1842–1929), Egon Schiele’s uncle and a senior railway official. After the death of Schiele’s father he became joint guardian of Egon and his sister Gertrude, and he took the boy in when he came to Vienna in 1906 to study at the Academy.
When was it painted, and how old was Schiele?
In 1907, the year Schiele turned seventeen. It belongs to his student years at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, where he studied from 1906 to 1909.
Where is the original, and what is it painted on?
It is in the Wien Museum in Vienna, under inventory number 304970. It is painted in tempera on cardboard and measures 32 x 39.9 cm.
Is it the same as the Czihaczek portrait in the Leopold Museum?
No. Schiele painted his uncle several times in 1907 and 1908, and the Leopold Museum holds other portraits of him, among them an oil painting of 47 x 29 cm and Leopold Czihaczek at the Piano. The work shown here is the tempera on cardboard in the Wien Museum.
Does it work as a gift?
Yes; if you are unsure which size to choose, there is a gift voucher.
