Egon Schiele & Adrian Ghenie: Shadow Paintings

The lost works of an Expressionist master recovered and reimagined by one of the most celebrated painters of his generation

In Shadow Paintings, the acclaimed Romanian painter Adrian Ghenie (born 1977) brings lost works of the great Egon Schiele (1890-1918) back to life. About a quarter of Schiele's paintings remain missing or were destroyed, existing only as shadowy black-and-white photographs. Ghenie's project takes viewers on a journey through decay and rebirth, transforming these shadow images into vivid manifestations of the color spectrum, blurring the lines between reality and abstraction. "Schiele was, of course, part of my mental archive," says Ghenie, whose painterly style has been compared to that of Francis Bacon. "I have two things in common with Schiele. Not in terms of style, but in terms of attitude. As soon as you leave behind the traditional constraints of anatomy, the way you deform the human form can become a portrait of your character or inner psyche on a deeper level."