“Two Ladies in a Café” by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (limited reproduction)

To put it simply, the Impressionists found their way back from the studios to the great outdoors, while the Expressionists discovered the metropolis and its inhabitants as their central motif. This was the fundamental experience of the time: Berlin had long since grown into a city of millions, and the urban interplay of familiarity and anonymity provided the painters with their subject matter. Kirchner's "Two Ladies in a Café" portrays typical, decidedly self-confident female figures of the era in what was presumably a gaslit setting.