In 1917, E. L. Kirchner spent the summer months on the Stafelalp above Davos for the first time. After the mental strain of his time of service in the army, the artist tried to numb his weariness and anxiety with alcohol, drugs and cigarettes. During these months, he was mentally and physically so exhausted that he was unable to paint or work. After his friend, the patron and collector Henry van de Velde, had visited Kirchner in Davos, he was so dismayed and worried that he referred him to a doctor friend, the psychiatrist Dr. Ludwig Binswanger at the Bellevue Sanatorium in Kreuzlingen on Lake Constance. From September 1917, Kirchner stayed at Lake Constance, where his health improved significantly after just a few weeks. He seemed to have overcome the worst part of his illness and eagerly began to work again, devoting himself to drawings and paintings that show doctors, nurses, patients and visitors.

It was at this time that Kirchner met the writer Leonhard Frank (1882-1961), who was known for, among other things, his novel "Die Räuberbande" (The Band of Robbers). Although he was not a patient at the sanatorium during these months, he continued to visit Dr. Binswanger whom he knew from previous stays, so that Kirchner could make several portraits of him on these occasions. A little earlier, Frank had published his work "Der Mensch ist gut", a collection of radically pacifist stories describing the horrors of war and making a loud and stirring plea for peace.

Kirchner may have recognized a kindred spirit in Frank, a like-minded person who processed his emotions in the written word - while Kirchner sought to overcome his pain in his paintings and prints. He portrayed the writer in woodcuts, drawings and in an oil painting (Gordon 495). "Kopf Dichter Leonhard Frank I" was created at a very challenging time for the artist and contains the emotional intensity and expressiveness so characteristic of Kirchner's artistic work at the time. [CH]