Items related to Mary Cassatt: Reflections of Women's Lives
An intimate portrayal of the world of women in the late 19th century, this text focuses on the life of the American Mary Cassatt. Her early decision to become a painter and to study alongside the impressionists in Paris defied the limited options for women of marriage and motherhood. Yet it is these very subjects that became central to her art. Using the paintings, prints and pastels Cassatt created throughout her career, this text explores the solitary, social, public and intimate worlds inhabited by the women of her family and social circle. In their simple daily tasks - writing a letter, sharing tea with a friend, caring for a fussing child - Cassatt saw subtle strength and genuine satisfaction. Through this volume, we can look back with her to a more tranquil time and celebrate the richness of the realm of women. Quotations from contemporary authors such as Edith Wharton and Henry James add further insight into this domestic world.
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Review:
For readers who are looking for an instructive first glance or an introduction to Mary Cassatt, this book is perfect. The medium-sized volume contains a biography of Cassatt by art historian Debra Mancoff and also offers reproductions that are surprisingly large and clear. These plates give readers as accurate a view as is possible in a book of Cassatt's virtuoso brushwork, sure-handed lines, and soft, deep aquatints.
Mancoff includes many of the artist's piquant remarks (as well as quotes from her friends and acquaintances, who found Cassatt often charming, always impressive, and sometimes "slashing" in her outspokenness). Upon seeing Degas's work for the first time, Cassatt flattened her nose against the window of the shop where they were shown, "to absorb all I could." When Degas urged her to exhibit with the impressionists instead of in the stuffy, official French salon, she "accepted with joy," she wrote. "I hated conventional art. I began to live." Mancoff has a nice touch with details, and her book should be just right for anyone who wants to learn more about this gifted and ambitious artist. The long, enriched captions for the plates are like the tape-recorded tours that accompany major exhibitions. They give the reader enough historical and critical background to make the works of art as meaningful as possible. --Peggy Moorman
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- PublisherFrances Lincoln Ltd
- Publication date1998
- ISBN 10 0711213658
- ISBN 13 9780711213654
- BindingHardcover
- Rating
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