Question 1

True or false: Kokoschka was primarily a sculptor who only rarely painted portraits.

Accepted Answer

False. He is best known as a painter and printmaker; his portraits and landscapes are central to his Expressionist oeuvre, not sculpture.

Question 2

True or false: During World War II, Kokoschka fled to Britain and later became a British citizen.

Accepted Answer

True. Labeled a 'degenerate artist' by the Nazis, he emigrated in 1938 to London, where he lived and worked until moving to Switzerland.

Question 3

True or false: Kokoschka wrote a play titled 'Murderer, the Hope of Women,' which caused a scandal.

Accepted Answer

True. His 1909 expressionist play shocked audiences with its violent, sexual themes and is considered one of the first modern dramas.

Question 4

True or false: Kokoschka taught at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts in the 1920s.

Accepted Answer

True. From 1919 to 1924, he was a professor at the academy, influencing a generation of students with his expressive style.

Question 5

True or false: Kokoschka was a core member of the Vienna Secession alongside Gustav Klimt.

Accepted Answer

False. While influenced by the Secession, Kokoschka was never an official member; he emerged later as a leading Expressionist, not a Secessionist.

Question 6

True or false: Oskar Kokoschka once had a life-size doll made in the likeness of his ex-lover Alma Mahler.

Accepted Answer

True. Devastated after their breakup, Kokoschka commissioned a custom doll to act as a surrogate companion, even taking it to the opera.

Question 7

True or false: Kokoschka designed a stained-glass window for Vienna's St. Stephen's Cathedral.

Accepted Answer

False. He created a stained-glass window for the Church of St. Nicholas in Hamburg, not in Vienna—a common geographic mix-up.

Question 8

True or false: Kokoschka invented the technique of reverse glass painting, which he used for many portraits.

Accepted Answer

False. Reverse glass painting is a centuries-old folk art technique; Kokoschka adapted it but did not invent it.

Oskar Kokoschka Trivia Questions