North Carolina Museum of Art

Panama Girls is characteristic of the new expressive style championed by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and his colleagues Erich Heckel and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff. Kirchner's rejection of naturalism was encouraged by his exposure to Henri Matisse and non-Western sculpture. After seeing work by Matisse in Berlin in 1909, he adapted the Fauve palette, using broad patches of vibrant colors for Panama Girls. South Pacific carvings Kirchner found in a Dresden museum influenced the composition. Panama Girls, boldly articulated and lined up in a shallow space, suggests a condensed frieze, a compositional device based on Palau Island decorated house beams.

Panama Girls is one of several dance-hall paintings by Kirchner. The artist chose the subject, exotic dancers considered shocking by proper bourgeois society, as a deliberate provocation. His celebration of low life and uninhibited behavior intentionally targeted established tastes.