Young woman with cats

Lovis Corinth's 'Young Woman with Cats' (1904) shows the German Impressionist at the height of his powers — his vigorous, sensuous handling of the female figure and the domestic animal subjects that he frequently combined created subjects of informal intimacy that contrasted with his more ambitious mythological and religious compositions. Corinth's engagement with the everyday subjects of the domestic world — the figure at the piano, the model at rest, the woman with pets — gave his oeuvre a warm human dimension alongside his more dramatic subjects.

Corinth renders the woman and cats with his characteristic loose, vigorous brushwork and warm palette — the woman's figure and the cats' forms depicted with the confident touch that was his most immediate characteristic. His handling of the domestic intimacy between the woman and the animals creates the subject's informal warmth, the specific relationship between human and cat observed with the close attention he gave to all his figure subjects. His impasto technique gives the surfaces a quality of physical immediacy.