Lithograph in colors after India ink drawings on firm paper
Austria, 1908
Oskar Kokoschka (1886-1980) – Austrian painter, graphic artist and illustrator
Each monogramed on the stone ‘OK’
From the book ‘Die träumenden Knaben’ with texts by the artist
Published by Wiener Werkstätten, Vienna
Printed at Berger and Chawla, Vienna
Catalog raisonné: Wingler/Welz 22-29
Image dimensions: each around 23.7 x 21.6 cm
The artist's book ‘Die träumenden Knaben’ is one of the earliest graphic works by Oskar Kokoschka; the auction record for a complete copy of the book is currently set at €25,200

Just 20 years old Oskar Kokoschka was commissioned by Wiener Werkstätte to create a children's book. From 1906 to 1908, the artist drew not only the illustrations, but also wrote the text. The India ink drawings were then colored and together with the typographic texts mechanically transferred to the printing stones. The edition from 1908 comprised 500 copies that were bound like an album with cloth cover interweaved with gold. By the ornamental stylized lines and unnuanced coloring of the compositions, the works can clearly be assigned to the Viennese Art Nouveau.

The eight lithographs in colors are each monogramed on the stone ‘OK’. The lateral binding margins and text columns are minor uneven cut from the sheets. The upper and lower edges partly seem to be minor trimmed, too. The sheets overall all are somewhat darkened and the colors are slightly faded. The now sheet-sized images measure each around 23.7 x 21.6 cm.

Oskar Kokoschka (1886-1980)

Kokoschka was born in Pöchlarn but grew up in Vienna. Thanks to the intercession of Carl Otto Czeschka (1878-1960), Kokoschka was allowed to study at the arts school where he stayed from 1905 until 1909. He moved to Berlin in 1910 where he illustrated the expressionist magazine Der Sturm and had a huge exhibition in Paul Cassirer’s gallery. Back in Vienna, he met Alma Mahler, yet when their tumultuous affair ended, Kokoschka voluntarily joined the military service. He got injured and spent the rest of the war as a war painter. He was named a professor in Dresden in 1919 and stayed there until 1924. With the beginning of the Nazi regime, Kokoschka had to flee to Prague after he was named, „The most degenerated amongst the degenerated“, and, “Hitler’s artistic enemy No. 1”. TheOskar Kokoschka Bund was founded in Prague with the aim of contradicting the ‘artistic’ machinations of the National Socialists and to support Kokoschka. In 1938, Kokoschka fled to England and became a British citizen in 1946 (he only re-accepted the Austrian citizenship in 1975). He founded the Schule des Sehens, an international fine arts summer academy in Salzburg and moved to Switzerland in 1953. Kokoschka participated in the documenta I, II and III and received many honours and awards. Regular exhibitions are held in his birthplace in Pöchlarn. Paintings by Kokoschka are today in the most important museums for modern art in Austria and Germany, but also in the National Gallery of Scotland and the National Gallery in Prague as well as in the Museum of Modern Art in New York. (fea)

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