When Benedict Cumberbatch prepared for his role as the beloved cat illustrator Louis Wain he was profoundly moved by the artist’s love and compassion. Immediately drawn to the way human emotions were revealed in Wain’s colorful drawings, he wanted others to know this amazing man’s work. An artist immensely popular in the United Kingdom (and America later on) during the Edwardian era, he was loved by many. But mental illness tormented him. Despite his immense popularity, his life was often brutish and hard.
Wain Was DevotedTo His Wife And His Beloved Cat.
But that creativity was spawned by tragedy, notes The Guardian. In 1883, Wain married Emily Richardson (played by actress Claire Foy). But right after the young couple married, Emily became very sick and with breast cancer. Louis knew he needed to find a way to cheer her while she was bedridden. He began drawing pictures of Peter, their kitty. Emily adored the drawings and she encouraged him to find a publisher.
Photo by the CFAF Foundation
This unnamed cutie played Wain’s kitty Peter in the movie:
Photo by StudioCanalUK/Twitter
Peter, as depicted by Wain:
Photo by AnArt4Life
Wain, as played by Cumberbatch, accompanied by another feline friend:
Photo by Screen Daily/Amazon
Later in his career, Wain paid tribute to Peter:
“To him, properly, belongs the foundation of my career.”
Undoubtedly for Louis and Emily, this was a bittersweet time. As her health declined his career took off. In 1884 when he was 24, Wain sold his first cat drawing to The Illustrated London News. In 1886 Madame Tabby’s Establishment, a children’s book by Caroline Hughes (under the pen-name Kari) featured one of his illustrations. His work here seemed a bit more serious in nature but he already demonstrated the ability to give his cats quite a lot of personality and playfulness, the Illustration Chronicles reports.
Months later The Illustrated London News commissioned Wain to draw more images based on their cute kitty. His work, A Kitten’s Christmas Party became hugely popular and successful. It set him on the road to fame in a time marked by great sadness. Just months later, Emily lost her battle with cancer.
Wain’s Popularity Increased Even As He Grieved.
He was despondent after Emily’s death but his art was receiving the attention it deserved. The fanciful work often featured cats doing typically human activities like golfing, drinking tea, and going to the opera. His illustrations weren’t necessarily satire but they highlighted the activities of the day (including teacher disciplining the kids at school, below). Wain was so successful that at one point he even branched out into ceramics. Considered an expert on cats and widely adored, he attained fame even in the U.S. But depression was never far behind and over time mental illness crept in.
Photo by Illustration Chronicles
During his lucid periods, he depicted his cats in adorably fanciful ways. Such as these cats playing a game of cards:
Photo by Psicologia y Mente
As he descended into mental illness, he drew his cats as looking suspicious or distrustful, and often with a colorful abstract background:
Photo by Ideru~commonswiki/Wikimedia Commons
As his condition worsened, the drawings became truly bizarre but were remarkably beautiful at the same time:
Photo by Artsy.net
Sometimes his cats were completely unrecognizable…as cats:
Photo by Psicologia y Mente
Perhaps due to his mental illness, and the fact that Wain was no businessman, unscrupulous people took advantage of him. He frequently sold his remarkable drawings outright and never requested publishing royalties. By the beginning of World War I in 1914 Louis was really struggling to find a market and soon a paper shortage followed thanks to the war. By 1920 he was living in poverty.
Descending Into Madness
As his situation became more desperate, Louis’s depression grew and his mental health declined. He became violent on some occasions and behaved erratically. People began speculating the artist was suffering from schizophrenia. As this poor man struggled, he wound up committed to the poverty ward of London’s Springfield Mental Hospital in 1924. He died in 1939 at an asylum not far from St. Albans.
Despite immense emotional pain, Wain’s illustrations of cats remained lively and vibrant. It’s this that has led Cumberbatch to call for more compassion in society, to practice kindness towards “oddballs and outsiders.”
In the foreword of an upcoming book about Wain, the actor notes:
“Being Louis Wain is to fall in love with, and to be left bereft at the end. What he carried through his life — along with his talents and his capacity for love and compassion — was the confusion and terror of a little boy who knew he didn’t fit in. And this I found profoundly sad and moving.”
“He brought such beauty and celebration and joy to the lives of so many people.”
Perhaps the most amazing thing about Wain is the way in which his art transfixes us. These beautifully drawn images tell a story of mental illness, but they also tell a story of the artist’s delight in cats. No matter how tormented he was, Wain clearly loved them all his life.
The movie The Electrical Life Of Louis Wain will premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in September 2021. It will appear on Amazon Prime in November. We’ve included another clip of the movie below.
