Hindering the artist is a crime, wrote Egon Schiele in 1912. At the time he was in prison for disseminating immoral drawings. Throughout his work the note of defiance, provocation and rebellion was sounded. Schiele's favourite subjects were female nudes and self-portraits, and he worked at his art with furious commitment, though it was not till shortly before his early death that he began to win real recognition. Today, with Oskar Kokoschka, he is seen as the most important of the Austrian artists who came after Klimt. This study examines the life and work of Egon Schiele through all the major oils and many of his erotic drawings.