The Artist’s Mother-in-Law 1920

This is a print by Lovis Corinth called "The Artist’s Mother-in-Law," and you can almost feel the scratch of the needle across the plate, can’t you? I can imagine Corinth in his studio, squinting at his subject, trying to capture her essence with a few deft lines. Maybe she wasn't the easiest person to get along with, and, hey, maybe that tension is visible in the prickly quality of the strokes. The face, the way it’s lined and shadowed, feels less about perfect likeness and more about exploring character, and a lifetime of experience. Painters are always looking, stealing, borrowing, and riffing off each other. There’s something about the directness of the mark-making here that feels connected to other portraitists. This image is a reminder that art is one big, ongoing conversation. We keep picking up where others leave off, trying to make sense of it all, one line, one print at a time.