If you're in the mood for an artist's drama over the Christmas period, Amazon Prime is the place to be: The Electrical Life of Louis Wain is a historical film about the life of the British artist Louis Wain (1860-1939), who is portrayed by the equally British actor Benedict Cumberbatch. Set in the early 1900s, the drama follows Wain, who is known for his playful and wide-eyed cat drawings. He goes about trying to decipher the world and in the process better understand his own life as well as his deep love for his wife Emily Richardson (played by Claire Foy). The film biopic by Japanese-British director Will Sharpe premiered at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado in September 2021 and is scheduled for release in German cinemas on 21 April 2022.
Louis Wain was born on 5 August 1860 in the London area of Clerkenwell and studied at the West London School of Art from 1877 to 1880. He was subsequently employed there as a teacher, but ended this activity in 1882 in order to work as a freelance artist from then on. The British painter then became known above all for his anthropomorphised cats. After returning to England from New York City, where he had lived from 1907 to 1910, he fell ill with schizophrenia. This led to a change in his cat paintings, which ultimately showed mainly eyes surrounded by ornaments.
