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Mary Cassatt

DATES: May 22, 1844 - June 14, 1926

ABOUT HER
When Mary Cassatt was 33, Edgar Degas saw one of her paintings for the first time. He was so struck by it he asked her to join the Impressionists. She agreed because working in his group of what she called the "independents," she didn't have to deal with juries and competitions.

Balancing Japanese influences and a love of the domestic scene, her paintings and prints frequently showed women and children at home in a lyrical golden light. Unlike many other artists of her generation she showed both women and children as people worthy of study and admiration, independent of their relationship to a man.

She was one of the best printmakers of her generation. She created over 220 prints during her life and was one of the most famous of the Impressionists.

Her eyesight began to fail in 1911. She died at the age of 82.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Mary Cassatt- Graphic Art, Adelyn Dohme Breeskin
Cassatt And Her Circle- Selected Letters, Nancy Mowll Mathews
Mary Cassatt: A Life, Nancy Mowll Mathews
Mary Cassatt, Nancy Mowll Mathews
Mary Cassatt: Paintings and Prints, Frank Getlein
Miss Mary Cassatt Impressionist From Pennsylvania, Frederick Sweet
Mary Cassatt, Forbes Watson

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