But a detail or an inscription can suddenly open a window into such terrible underlying fragility.’ On the surface, his cats are innocent, playful, and the way he delighted in colour and pattern is glorious. His work is delightful, but it has this tension. ‘He led a remarkable life, and overcame an almost unbelievable array of tragedies. ‘I found him an incredibly inspiring figure,’ says the film’s director Will Sharpe. And whereas in the late ’60s you could have picked up a Wain original for a few pounds, today you’d be looking at the better part of £15,000 for one of the more sought-after works. An exhibition of the paintings he produced while in Bethlem hospital in the 1920s has also recently opened at its Museum of the Mind, exploring the restorative effect of animals on patients’ mental health. Now, though, a new film featuring Benedict Cumberbatch as Wain, Claire Foy as his wife Emily, and Andrea Riseborough as his sister Caroline, narrated by Olivia Colman, is spearheading a wave of new-found interest in his work. Wain’s renown has plummeted since his death in 1939. ‘English cats that do not look like Louis Wain cats are ashamed of themselves.’ ‘ invented a cat style, a cat society, a whole cat world,’ said HG Wells, who was one of many celebrities to add his name to a campaign to rescue the artist and instal him in the more comfortable Bethlem.
At his peak in the 1890s, he was churning out 600 designs a year. His pictures of anthropomorphic cats (they play the tuba, they pour tea, they wear monocles and muffs and cravats) filled the illustrated press, along with children’s books and annuals. In turn-of-the-century Britain, Wain was the country’s favourite illustrator. He had been violent towards his family, and believed ‘the flickering of the cinema has taken electricity out of his sisters’ brains’, as the doctor reviewing his case noted when 64-year-old Wain was transferred to Bethlem Royal Hospital in Beckenham the following year. Such popularity (and pluck) makes it all the more desolating to learn that within three years, Wain was committed to the paupers’ ward of Springfield lunatic asylum – to use the parlance of the time – in south-west London. In 1921, he was similarly observed charming his way into a fair by asking for scrap paper, tossing off a rapid sketch (again, cats) and solemnly handing it to the turnstile attendant. Louis Wain was once so famous – and so adored – that he could swap a drawing of dancing cats for a haircut.