William Oktavec
czech-born American artist who invented screen painting
William Oktavec (born Wenceslaus Anton Oktavec Sr.; October 25, 1884 – June 2, 1956) was a Czech-born American artist, draftsman, butcher and grocer, best known for inventing screen painting.
Personal life
Oktavec was born in Kasejovice in Bohemia, Austria-Hungary on October 25, 1884. He was the fifth of eight siblings. His father owned a small farm in Kasejovice. Emigrating from Bremen, Germany, to New York City in 1901, Oktavec resided in Baltimore by 1912. Oktavec visited Kasejovice in 1938, which was the last time he ever saw his European family members.
Career
While living in East Baltimore's Little Bohemia, Oktavec owned a grocery store. Originally a house, Oktavec refashioned it into a grocery. The store was located at 847 North Collington Avenue at the intersection with Ashland Avenue, adjacent to the Bohemian parish of St. Wenceslaus Catholic Church.
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This entry incorporates text from “William Oktavec” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.