Interpretive Resource

Mary Cassatt at the Louvre. The Paintings Gallery, 1879-1880
Etching, soft-ground etching, aquatint, and drypoint on ivory wove
Japanese tissue, 15th state, Plate: 12 x 5 in. (30.5 x 12.6 cm.); Sheet: 13 3/8 x 6 7/8 in. (34 x 17.5 cm)
Gift of Walter S. Brewster, 1951.323
In 1877, thanks to an invitation from Degas, Mary Cassatt exhibited with the Impressionists, becoming the only American artist to be an established member of the group. Degas soon became Cassatt’ s mentor when they closely collaborated in 1879 for a journal of Impressionist prints entitled Jour et la Nuit, or Day and Night. Although the magazine never materialized, Cassatt posed for a number of Degas’s works during this period, including this print.

An excellent example of Degas’s mastery of portraiture, the print features Cassatt in France’s foremost museum, the Louvre. She is set off by a seated companion, probably her sister Lydia. She, like we, views Cassatt from behind. Yet despite this provocative daring rear pose -- we never see Cassatt’s face -- we sense who she is by where, and how, Degas places her: in a museum, absorbed by the artwork, with her older sister as companion. Additionally, as Degas wrote in his notebooks: "Her slender erect figure, neatly tailored, and her crisply furled umbrella all convey to us something of Mary Cassatt’s tense, energetic character."

The work is also a tour de force of printmaking, combining etching, aquatint, and drypoint. Its flattened shapes and long, narrow format derive from the Japanese prints that Degas collected. To arrive at this striking portrayal of his friend, Degas made twenty known versions, or states, of the work, which is the second largest number ever recorded by the artist for a print. He continually refined it, making changes in tone and texture, and once, even altered the composition, making the left pillar larger. This sumptuous, delicate version is from the fifteenth state.

Classroom Suggestions

1. Have students compare Mary Cassatt in the Painting Gallery of the Louvre with Ballet at the Paris Opera. What similarities and differences exist in their compositions? vantage points? use of cropped forms? their recording of specific moments in time?

2. Have students study Mary Cassatt, the only American artist to become a member of the Impressionists, and her relationship with Degas. What influence of Degas can be seen in her subjects, media, and compositions?

3. Degas combined several different printing techniques in the making of Mary Cassatt in the Painting Gallery of the Louvre. Using the glossary to assist, summarize for students the different processes. Have students examine the work and discuss the artist’s ability to evoke color, texture, and depth with the black-and-white printing media.