Mädchen im Waldbach depicts Corinth's wife Charlotte Berend-Corinth sitting on a rock drying her legs by the river at St. Ulrich im Grodnertal, Tyrol. It was painted during the second visit that the Corinth family made to St. Ulrich. Corinth used his wife as a model against landscape backgrounds on numerous occasions during these visits. While working on Mädchen im Waldbach Corinth was worried whether the chosen site by a raging stream wasn't too dangerous for Charlotte, 'Nein, die Situation ist doch zu gefährlich, du darfst unmöglich da sitzen! Na, aber vielleicht doch so lange, bis ich fertig bin, ich werde so schnell malen wie ich kann!'
(C. Berend-Corinth, op. cit., p. 29)

In Mädchen im Waldbach Charlotte Corinth is depicted wearing Tyrolian costume and Corinth has rendered the scene with vibrant impressionist brushwork and colours. As Hans Roethel observes, during 1913, 'his palette becomes richer, brighter, more colourful. The paint gushes and foams; laid on with boldness and verve, it sprays lavishly across the canvas. But in spite of his apparently heedless exuberance every stroke of his brush counts'. (Lovis Corinth, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, 1959, p. 4).