WAE26: Taboo. Egon Schiele

Michele Mally directs this intimate cinematic portrait exploring the life and radical legacy of Egon Schiele — one of the most provocative artists of the early 20th century. Through archival material and expert insight, the film reveals the emotional intensity and uncompromising vision that continue to influence contemporary art.

Set in Krumlov, the hometown of Egon Schiele’s mother, Taboo. Egon Schiele offers a bold psychoanalytic reading of the artist’s deep connection to this Bohemian town—both as a physical place and a symbol of maternal longing, desire, and confinement. Through Schiele’s paintings, writings, and poetry, the film explores his troubled relationship with women, his obsession with time and death, and his raw, modern vision that is still unsettling today.

Drawing parallels with Kafka and the decline of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, this documentary is a cinematic journey into the mind and legacy of one of the most radical artists of the 20th century, who died at just 28 in 1918, leaving behind an explosive body of work made of hundreds of paintings and thousands of drawings.

The film unfolds from the Egon Schiele Studio, the house with a garden where the artist lived with his companion and muse Wally Neuzil. Here, a young debut actress, Erika Carletto, becomes a poetic presence guiding the viewer through Schiele’s universe, her performance and singing evoking the charged atmospheres of Vienna and Prague at the turn of the century, brought to life through archival footage. An original score by Laura Masotto shapes the film’s emotional landscape.

The film also explores Schiele’s complex emotional bonds—his abandoned love Wally Neuzil, his distant marriage to Edith Harms, and a profound, still-emerging connection with his sister Gerti—revealing an artist driven by an unfulfilled longing to return to his origins.

Through interviews with leading international experts—including Jane Kallir, Ralph Gleis, and Kerstin Jesse—alongside art historians, philosophers, and psychoanalysts, the documentary weaves biography, interpretation, and cinematic imagination. Schiele’s story ends in 1918, with the collapse of an empire, but his vision continues to speak powerfully to our present, confronting us with the fragile and unresolved essence of being human.

Screening Sat-Sun, 11-12 July at Luna Leederville and Luna on SX.