The Orientalist painter Ludwig Deutsch, an Austrian by birth, studied at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste (Academy of Fine Arts) in Vienna before settling in Paris, where he became a pupil of the French history painter and sculptor Jean-Paul Laurens (1838–1921) (Bénézit, 2006, p. 828; Thornton, 1994, p. 70). Deutsch made several trips to Cairo in the 1890s, where he made sketches and acquired a large collection of artifacts and costumes, he depicted these in his paintings illustrating aspects of Islamic culture, which were mostly executed in his Paris studio (Williams, 2005, p. 117). His houses in the Pigalle area of Paris and the South of France were decorated in the 'Islamic manner', with a mashrabiyya, painted ceramic tiles, textiles and metalwork probably used by him as studio accessories, as was customary with many academic artists of the second half of the 19th century(Thornton, 1994, p. 72).
Deutsch usually painted in oil on wooden panels, although some watercolours are to be found (Thornton, 1994, p. 72). After 1883, he devoted most of his canvases to scenes of daily life in Cairo. In rich harmonious colours, the architectural subjects, as well as the Oriental decorative objects are treated in breathtakingly microscopic detail (Thornton, 1994, p. 70; Bénézit, 2006, p. 828).
In addition to this extraordinary technical ability, Deutsch devoted his attention to small gestures and individual expressions that give his people life and character (Thornton, 1994, p. 72). Deutsch concentrated on the visually interesting elements of textiles, architectural details and patterns; but he also created an assembly line of paintings, repeating the same settings but using different subjects, actors and activities to create an impression of variety (Williams, 2005, p. 117). In order to ensure the archaeological accuracy of architectural elements in his paintings, he made use of photography; his works show parallels above all with photographs of the Armenian photographer G. Lékégian (active circa 1880–1920) (Perez, 1988, p. 74).
Deutsch exhibited his historical and genre paintings at the Salon des Artistes Français from 1879 to 1925, receiving an honourable mention in 1898 (Bénézit, 2006, p. 828; Thornton, 1994, p. 70). He participated in the Austrian section of the Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1900, winning a gold medal (Bénézit, 2006, p. 828; Thornton, 1994, p. 72). By 1919, his first name appeared in the Salon catalogues as 'Louis', not 'Ludwig', presumably as he had acquired French citizenship (Thornton, 1994, p. 72).

Bénézit, E. (ed.) (2006). Deutsch, Ludwig. In Dictionary of artists (Vol. 4, p. 828). Paris: Gründ.

Perez, N. (1988). Focus East: Early Photography in the Near East (1839-1885). New York: Abrams.

Thornton, L. (1994). The Orientalists: Painter-travellers, Courbevoie: ACR.

Williams, C. (2005). Nineteenth-Century Images of Cairo: From the Real to the Interpretative. In N. AlSayyad, I. A. Bierman, & N. Rabbat (Eds.), Making Cairo medieval (pp. 95-124). Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.