Field kitchen (art postcard) 1915

Image description see below.

JQAW# G_1915_130
Oil on canvas? ?? x ?? cm
Signature: J.Q. Ɑdams 5.X. 15.
Art postcard reproduction, original lost.
Image source: HGM Vienna No. 6200/2008

A group of Uhlans (k.u.k. cavalry troops in typical red/blue uniform with chako hats) are standing (one sitting on horseback) gathered around a wheeled (drawn by two grazing white horses) mobile kitchen with a smoking chimney. In the background a thatched farmhouse and wide hilly landscape.

The picture, which was called "Feldküche der 13er Ulanen bei Ostrow" (Field Kitchen of the 13 Uhlans at Ostrow) at the Künstlerhaus exhibition, is lost in the original and has survived only as an art postcard reproduction (called Fahrküche/travelling kitchen there).
The name Ostrow refers to the central Polish town of Ostrow, where an independent Polish Republika Ostrowska was briefly proclaimed in 1918. A particularly compelling picture Adams painted of the everyday life of soldiers, even though it is obviously painted with a propagandist message in mind, which was Adams' mission as a member of the artist troupe of the War Press Corps. In the everyday life of the war, a regular warm meal for the cavalry soldiers likely was not always available.

Cross-references

Exhibited

1915 Künstlerhaus Vienna (EL 60 1915/16 #1249)

Literature

Provenance

1915 Private collection Oskar Neumann (listed in 1915 in KH EL No. 1249 with insurance value 500 Kr and return to owner as of 3.11.1915).
Since then lost.