Erotic Sketchbooks: Oskar Kokoschka

Although he is best known for his Expressionist portraits and landscapes, Oskar Kokoschka was a passionate painter of women. His portrait of his lover Alma Mahler, The Tempest (Bride of the Wind) is one of his most famous works. This intimate book explores Kokoschka's experiments with watercolor.

The artist's disdain for the stilted, academic sketching of posed models is exhibited in the spontaneous renderings he made of people he randomly invited into his studio. Kokoschka's models are notably uninhibited, a tribute to his ability to elicit freedom and movement from them. Printed in muted colors and on the finest matte stock, the sketches and drawings here are presented simply and elegantly. A brief biography of the artist enhances the overall sublime experience-a treat for the senses and the intellect.