Mary Cassatt

1844 - 1926

American (Allegheny City, Pennsylvania - Le Mesnil-Théribus, France)

Born to a wealthy family in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania, Cassatt lived her life between her home in the United States and Europe. She lived many years of her life abroad as a child and visited many cultural capitals in Europe, including London and Paris. There, she was exposed to the fine arts and became determined to paint professionally despite her parents’ disapproval. She began studying painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia at the age of 15. In 1866, Cassatt moved to Paris, where she studied privately under prominent artists. Cassatt began exhibiting with the Impressionists in 1877 at the invitation of Edgar Degas.
Cassatt is most well known for her works showing the social and private lives of women, particularly those that depict mother and child. After the turn of the century, she almost exclusively explored this theme. Although her work was sometimes criticized for being “too feminine,” most critics still acknowledged her technical skill. Cassatt ultimately worked until she was unable to, going nearly blind in 1914. In her later life, she took up the cause of women’s suffrage. In the decades since her death in 1926, Cassatt came to be considered one of the most important American emigrant artists and has had a notable influence on other women in the arts around the world.