Vaudeville Theater (English Dancing Couple) 1913

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner made this painting of a Vaudeville Theater with oil on canvas. It’s like the whole scene is vibrating with the energy of the dance! I’m imagining Kirchner in the thick of it, maybe a little sweaty, trying to capture this wild moment. The brushstrokes are so loose, almost reckless, like he’s wrestling with the paint to get it to do what he wants. I love the electric blue petticoat, it feels like it has its own gravitational pull. The way he uses color feels so intuitive, like he’s following his gut as much as his eye. Kirchner was part of a group called Die Brücke, and they were all about pushing the boundaries of what painting could be. I see echoes of other painters like Munch, who was all about capturing raw emotion, and maybe even a little Toulouse-Lautrec in the subject matter. Artists are always in conversation, riffing off each other, and Kirchner adds his own voice to the mix. His Vaudeville Theater seems like an invitation to embrace the messy, imperfect, and uncertain aspects of life and art.