Oskar Kokoschka

Oskar Kokoschka (1886-1980) Double Portrait of Trudl (1931) Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

For the Austrian Expressionist painter and writer Oskar Kokoschka, the years of the Great War of 1914-1918 marked a decisive period both in his personal life and in his professional career. His three-year tempestuous love affair with Alma Mahler, widow of the composer Gustav Mahler and the major inspiration for Kokoschka's work, ended badly when Alma aborted their child. Meanwhile, Kokoschka, pacifist and humanitarian by nature and education, volunteered for military duty and was gravely wounded in 1915 while fighting at the Ukranian front. Ref. The Journal of the American Medical Association