This week in the War, 11–17 December 1944: Deaths of painter Wassily Kandinsky and band leader Glen Miller

This week in the war saw the deaths of one of the world’s great artists, Wassily Kandinsky, and one of the world’s great performers, Glen Miller. They died within a two days of each other.

As a student, Moscow-born Kandinsky abandoned his study of law to go to Munich to become a painter.

He went back to Russia at the beginning of the First World War but returned to Germany in 1921 and subsequently became a professor at the Bauhaus school of art and architecture in Weimar. After the Nazis closed the Bauhaus in 1933, he moved to France. He was one of the pioneers of modern abstract art.

Kandinsky died on 13 December 1944 at Neuilly-sur-Seine.

American band leader, Glenn Miller, formed his first jazz group in the 1920s and became famous for his song Moonlight Serenade.

During the war, Miller enlisted in the US Army (later transferring to the US Army Air Forces) and organized numerous concerts for Allied troops. His song In the Mood became a popular wartime hit.

Miller died on 15 December 1944 when his plane went missing in bad weather over the English Channel.