The Schiele-Kant Connection

Here at A&M, my major is Philosophy. Although my thoughts gathered through the study of Philosophy often exert themselves in my art, it is a rare and savored occurence when I can relate something which I have found through other's art to something which I have studied in Philosophy. Today in class, I had that opportunity. In Egon Schiele's The Self Seer II (Death and the Man)
and A Nude Model before a Mirror, Schiele places himself within the painting. He arguably cannot remove himself from his works because he is inherently intertwined in anything which he makes. This theory is called projection. It is oft- used by the artists of the time, in reaction to the beliefs of Sigmund Freud, a famous and trending, Psychologist at the time. Given that I am not a Freud scholar, I see more parallels between this idea of projection and the 19th Century Philosopher Immanuel Kant. In Kant's The Critique of Practical Reason, he asserts that we cannot completely remove ourselves from the lens that we see the world through. That is, essentially, we cannot say that anything exists or is the way that we believe it to be without acknowledging that we view the world through each individual's "rose colored glasses." This, to me, is in great alignment with how Schiele presents himself in his paintings. By ever-including himself in his narrative, he is acknowledging his "lens" and creating a construct of his own reality through the painting which would be unavailable to others without this creation of his.  In conclusion, from two completely different fields of study, just from exposing myself to them both I have been able to draw connections which I would not have seen otherwise. Perhaps in the Visualization center, it would be interesting to have some sort of forum for drawing connections through art, across major-college lines. Certainly I would not be the only one to see some striking connections.

Shiele- The Self Seer

For more on Immanuel Kant, see:  http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-moral/