After serving in the First World War, in 1925 Ernst Nepomucky (later nicknamed Nepo) co-founded the group of artists called “Die Waage”, and just a couple of years later, became part of theVienna Secession. Although remaining constantly influenced by Giovanni Segantini’s Divisionist-Symbolist style, the works which Nepo produced in this decade were strongly inspired by the secessionist environment, with a particular eye on the highly radical style of Egon Schiele, the leading exponent of the Expressionist movement.

The drawing presented here, dated 1921, belongs to this period. It comes from an abundant core of portraits and self-portraits from the 1920s which display a formal expressive language strongly reminiscent of that of the Expressionist artists. What strikes the eye is the closeness to his angular figures in these drawings filled with a crazed tension that tell of a painful experience of existential discomfort. Many of his works, and here it is even more evident, have a strong and violent impact on the viewer, who almost adopts the position of a psychoanalytic interpreter. An agitated line is entrusted with expressing the meanderings of the painter’s mind. Nepo was a skilled draughtsman, with a clear, rapid and dry line, devoid of second thoughts; in his works he made no room for the decorative or any aesthetic complacency.

The early 1920s for Ernst Nepo were a period of fervent experimentation. From these years comes the series of watercolour wash drawings that might be called the “Blue Portraits”. The physiognomy and psyche of the subjects are captured with an acutely analytical eye, the attention focused exclusively on the face, occasionally on the hands, while the rest of the body is often completely excluded as the face, especially the eyes, and the hands are the most representative elements of a subject. The face as a reader of the soul, the hands as an indicator of sensitivity.

The most prominent feature is the predominantly blue coloring, which tends to remove the subjects from any direct access to reality and to transport them into a cold, artificial sphere.

There is no certain information about the identity of this sitter, however, according to information passed orally to the heirs it could be an Austrian poet named Foltin who likely commissioned the portrait from the artist. The detail of the thick fur and its striking brown colour contrasts sharply with the subject’s face. The face is thin, the deep wrinkles emphasizing his character. The gaze of the presumed poet is intense and fixed on the viewer, and his ruffled eyebrows lend great expressiveness. The care over the drawing, masterful in its execution, makes this work a real gem in this particular period of the artist’s work.

After this first period closer to Secessionist and Expressionist currents, Nepo became fascinated by Neue Sachlichkeit, an artistic movement born in Germany at the end of the Great War as a reaction to Expressionism. The movement came to an end with the rise of the Third Reich, which termed it “Degenerate Art” (Entartete Kunst).

Despite the fact that not many of his works are typical of the Neue Sachlichkeit movement, Ernst Nepo is considered by international critics to be one of the most incisive exponents of this movement in Tyrol. The general public knows him above all for his portraits, his numerous frescoes, mosaics, and paintings on glass. His works are also kept at theTyrolean State Museumin Innsbruck, the University of Applied Arts collection in Vienna, and theMuseion – Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art – in Bozen (Bolzano).