Rating and value of paintings by Oskar Kokoschka

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Artist's rating and value

On the art market, Oskar Kokoschka's rating is extremely high. His most prized works are his expressionist canvases, both portraits and landscapes. The artist is particularly prized among 20th-century Austrian painters and draughtsmen. Thus, the price at which Oskar Kokoschka's works sell ranges from €10 to €15,832,000 at auction.

In 2018, his painting Joseph de Montesquiou-Fezensac (oil on canvas), dating from 1910, sold for €15,832,000, while it was estimated at between €13,342,000 and €17,788,000.

Order of value from the most basic to the most prestigious

The artist's style and technique

Oskar Kokoschka, a leading figure of Expressionism, produced works that bear witness to the turmoil and upheaval of the first half of the 20th century.      

Born in Vienna, this painter was influenced by the great masters of his time, notably Gustav Klimt and Carl Otto Czeschka, with whom he acquired a solid training. His art, however, soon took a very distinct direction.

Contrary to his Viennese contemporaries, Kokoschka did not seek to flatter, but to reveal, which earned him a reputation as a provocateur. His portraits, often commissioned by the Viennese elite, reflect a ruthless gaze on his models, whom he did not hesitate to depict with disarming brutality.

Early on, his works are marked by intense colors, bold contrasts and frequent use of black, which he applies in broad flat tints, lending his canvases a dramatic and sometimes oppressive dimension.

Arnaud Schönberg sums up this approach perfectly when he says that Kokoschka favors truth over beauty. Indeed, the artist seems intent on capturing not only the appearance but also the tormented soul of his subjects, revealing their flaws and anxieties with a sincerity that baffles.

This quest for authenticity is reflected in a dark palette, dominated by cold, earthy tones, often enhanced by touches of bright red or yellow, as if to better underline the tension that inhabits his compositions.

His brushstrokes, nervous and energetic, convey a form of restrained violence, as if he wanted to extract from reality the suffering that lurked within.

Kokoschka's style evolved over the years, however, influenced by the political and social events of his time. Faced with the rise of Nazism, he adopted an attitude of defiance and resistance.

His refusal to conform to the expectations of official, regime-controlled art made him a favorite target of the Nazi authorities.

His works, deemed too subversive, were exhibited in 1937 at the famous Degenerate Art Exhibition in Munich, where they rubbed shoulders with the creations of other artists rejected for their non-conformism.

Far from being intimidated, Kokoschka pursued his critique through paintings that forcefully denounced the brutality and absurdity of totalitarian regimes. The artist showed unwavering audacity, using his brush as a weapon against oppression, refusing any concession to a system he deemed dehumanizing.

Thus, Oskar Kokoschka's career remains marked by an inseparable aesthetic and political commitment, where each painting becomes a space for combat, a revolt against lies and compromise.

His work, deeply marked by the dramas of his time, remains a poignant testimony to the tormented history of the 20th century, oscillating between light and shadow, between beauty and raw truth.

Oskar Kokoschka, humanist painter of anguish

Oskar Kokoschka (1886-1980) was a 20th-century Austrian painter and dramatist, renowned for his unique expressionist style.

Born into a modest family in Pöchlarn, he was encouraged by his mother to take early classes at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, where he quickly distinguished himself for his bold technique and intense, psychological approach to portraiture.

Heavily influenced by the Viennese art movements of his time, he met Gustav Klimt, who exerted a major influence on his work, particularly in his use of color and form.

From 1909, Kokoschka became a central figure in the Viennese Secession, a group of artists who rejected academic conventions in favor of freer, more personal expression.

His art is distinguished by a profound psychological vision of his subjects, which he translates into his portraits through vigorous brushstrokes and vivid colors, often used to translate the soul of his models.

His relationship with Alma Mahler, whom he paints in a famous portrait, marks a particularly intense period in his work. This portrait is one of Kokoschka's most emblematic, capturing the complexity of his sitter with such expressive force that the image seems almost alive.

Kokoschka's involvement in the First World War was a major turning point in his career. After being severely wounded, he returned to painting with a new rage, exploring physical and emotional suffering in his works.

His creative process resembles that of Otto Dix, Geroges Rouault or Amedeo Modigliani, all war-scarred - these three artists needed, through painting, to express their suffering and their vision of war.

It was during this period that he created the Les Fantômes series, a body of work marked by distorted figures and dark colors, representing the pain and debris of war. His work, now more tormented, explores themes of loss, memory and human violence.

Exiled to Prague and then London after the Anschluss in 1938, Kokoschka continued his artistic work outside Austria. Far from his native land, his art became more introspective, marked by a sense of isolation and nostalgia.

His portraits, often large-scale, continue to reflect his quest for psychological truth, while his landscapes become increasingly allegorical, exploring themes of exile and absence.

Kokoschka's work, both tumultuous and deeply human, makes him a major figure of Expressionism. His unique approach to color, form and psychology enables him to capture the emotional intensity of his subjects and offer us a radical vision of the human condition in the 20th century.

Oskar Kokoschka - Humanist painter of anguish

Focus on The Wind Bride, 1913, Oskar Kokoschka

Intense in its sensuality, Oskar Kokoschka's The Wind Bride immediately plunges the viewer into a whirlwind of contradictory emotions.

This work depicts Alma Mahler, the artist's passionate love, in a posture both gentle and unsettling, where the beauty of her face seems to rocket through the air like a fleeting vision.

The features of her face, accentuated by bold, lively brushstrokes, are shrouded in an aura of mystery, as if the artist were trying to capture the very essence of being, while leaving an element of inaccessibility hanging in the air.

The texture of the skin, almost palpable, seems to vibrate under the tension of the colors, a mixture of warm reds and yellows that evoke both passion and suffering.

The background of the painting, all in gradations of blues and greens, contrasts powerfully with the central subject. This blurred, almost ethereal setting reinforces the impression of floating, as if Alma's portrait were suspended between the earthly world and the beyond.

This blur, as it were, lends the work a dreamlike, almost unreal dimension, echoing the painter's inner torments.

The posture of the central figure, eyes barely open, seems both serene and tragic. The image of Alma Mahler becomes a symbol of desire, aspiration and flight.

Kokoschka, through this portrait, captures the essence of his tumultuous love and doomed relationship, while providing space for the female figure to dissipate into the air, like a light but inexorable mist.

The artist's gaze seems to pierce beyond appearance, highlighting a profound psychological fragility. The intensity of the warm colors juxtaposes the coldness of the background, accentuating the tension between carnal love and the pain inherent in a relationship marked by loss.

Every brushstroke seems, in reality, an inner struggle to grasp and hold what cannot be possessed, to freeze a fleeting, elusive beauty.

Through this work, Kokoschka invites us to explore the intricacies of the human soul, the illusion of possession and the fragility of desire. The treatment of light, at once intense and diffuse, seems at times to efface the individuality of the model, transforming her into a universal symbol of love and sorrow.

This work by Kokoschka ends in a silent breath, confronting us with a painful truth: the intensity of passion, however beautiful, can only be ephemeral, doomed to vanish in the wind.

His signature

Although there are variations, here's a first example of his signature:

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