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German History in Documents and Images
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Oskar Kokoschka and Herwarth Walden in the Design Room of Der Sturm (1916)
When the Expressionist painter Oskar Kokoschka (1886-1980) held his first solo exhibition in the “Secessionist” gallery of Ernst Cassirer in Berlin in 1910, Herwarth Walden (1878-1941) was greatly impressed. He decided to publish the controversial young artist’s illustrated Expressionist drama, Murderer, the Hope of Women [Mörder, Hoffnung der Frauen], in the first issue of his new journal Der Sturm [The Storm] (1910). Kokoschka was also on the staff of Der Sturm, which quickly became the most significant mouthpiece for Expressionism in both literature and the visual arts. After World War I, Kokoschka was appointed professor at the Art Academy of Dresden. His works were later confiscated and branded by the Nazis as “degenerate.”