The German painter Lovis Corinth is not exactly a
household word in this country. If pressed, informed New
Yorkers may be able to connect him with an uncomfortable,
agitated self-portrait in the Museum of Modern Art in which
the brushstrokes seem to be stirred by a strong wind,
blurring the image of the bullet-headed, blunt-nosed painter
and muddying the color. Barnard alumnae of a certain
vintage, if they were lucky enough to have been invited to
see Professor Julius Held’s collection, should remember a
vigorous head of a man in a dark fedora. The really
knowledgeable might mention the show at the Gallery of Modern Art
in 1964 or the Corinth print exhibition
held at the National Gallery, Washington, a few years ago.
There was an impressive group of his portraits and nudes shown at
the Royal Academy, London, in 1985 as part of a rather
skewed survey of twentieth-century German art designed to
establish legitimate bloodlines for such recently emerged
stars as Baselitz, Penck, and Kiefer. But generally there
have been few opportunities to see Corinth’s work in any
depth outside of Germany—and not many within his native
country, either—so despite his claim to a place in the
pantheon of German modernists, he remains an elusive figure
who hovers on the periphery of the history of twentieth-century
painting, even on the periphery of the consciousness of
those of us who care passionately about that history.

Even if you have a clear idea of what Corinth’s work
looks