American artist Mary Cassatt was considered one of “Les Trois Grandes Dames of Impressionism” alongside Berthe Morisit and Marie Bracquemond. Born in Pittsburgh on May 22, 1844 to a very wealthy family. Her father Robert Simpson Cassatt made a fortune in the stock market and with land sales. Her mother Katherine came from a banking family that was well educated and believed her own daughter should be as well.
As a child they traveled Europe stopping in Berlin, London and Paris and taking classes in art and music while also learning French and German. In Paris at the World’s Fair she laid her eyes on the French masters for the first time. Delacroix, Corot, Courbet, Ingres and Degas and her life changed forever.
Returning to Pennsylvania, she begged her parents for art lessons and by 1859 at just fifteen years old they finally gave in. Mary enrolled in the Academy of Fine Arts but her fellow bohemian feminist students didn’t make her parents too happy. At the time women were not allowed to paint live models, so she was stuck painting still lives and flowers while also soaking up those feminisit ideals, much to her parents' chagrin. Bored with painting flowers she decided to teach herself how to paint by copying the masters, but there were only so many she could find in Pittsburgh.
In 1866, she packed up her brushes and moved to Paris, but the city of artists wasn’t that much easier. Being a woman held her back, she couldn’t go to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and had to find her own teacher that would take an eager young lady. Jean-Leon Gérôme who also taught a long list of artists saw something in Mary and took her under his wing. Spending most of her days with Gérôme in the Louvre copying paintings and mingling with the other young artists of Paris. In 1868 she began to study under Thomas Couture who had also been Manet’s teacher.
Sadly, just two years later as the Franco Prussian war began she headed back to the United States and what would be a wasteland for the culture seeking Cassatt. Back in her parents' house she painted all day, much to her father's disapproval. He didn’t like her chosen career and refused to support it. He paid for her lodging, food and spending money but refused to buy brushes or any painting supplies.
A few of her paintings were exhibited in a New York gallery, but none of them sold leaving her discouraged and it was about to get even worse. With a collection of canvases she traveled to Chicago. The day after she had them set up in a gallery the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 swept through the city destroying everything in its path including her paintings. At the edge of giving up, a chance meeting would change everything.
The Roman Catholic Bishop Michael Domenic of Pittsburgh asked her to paint two copies of Correggio’s paintings for the cathedral. It came with enough money to travel to Italy and spend as long as she needed to complete the monumental project. By 1874 she was back in Paris and selling a painting at the Salon, things were looking up. Although, her outspoken opinions on the Salon and how women artists were treated weren’t winning her a lot of friends in the circles she needed to be in. At the next Salon her paintings were quickly rejected as many of the Impressionists were. Discouraged like the other artists, Degas invited her to be a part of the Impressionist Exhibit in 1879. She had three paintings hanging on the walls alongside the painters that finally made her feel like she was part of a group that accepted her.
Just a few years before her parents had moved to Paris to be with Mary and her sister Lydia. Her father had come around a bit more to her painting and was happy to support her. Mary never had an interest in getting married as she knew it had to be a choice to be a painter or a wife and was happy living with her sister and parents and few friends. One of her closest friends, Louisine Elder, was much younger than Mary but they shared hours in the museums together. Mary would share with her how to look at art and what she should purchase. Later when Lousine married a rather wealthy man they began to gather up the paintings of the Impressionist all thanks to Mary. Their collection became one of the largest personal collections that was later given to the Museum of Modern Art in NY.
In 1882, her sister Lydia died at 45 from Bright's disease which crushed Mary. Staying inside day and night in seclusion and never touching her brushes. Her father tried to encourage her to paint to no avail. On one of her first voyages out she was returning home on her horse crossing the Champs Elysees when her horse slipped, fell and fractured her leg.
In 1911, she was diagnosed with cataracts, diabetes and rheumatism but she didn’t let that stop her. A few years later she contributed to the Sufforgete movement back in Philadelphia by sending eighteen of her paintings to a charity event. Her sister in law Eugenie was not a supporter of women voting and let all of her society friends know that they should boycott the event. Mary was so mad, she decided to sell off all her paintings that had been intended as inheritance of her sister in law's children.
In the later years of her life she purchased the Chateau de Beaufresne outside of Paris where she and her parents lived. On June 14, 1926 at 82 years old she died and was buried her in the family plot near the chateau in Le Mesnil-Théribus.
In her life she was barely known in the United States as an artist, but well known in France. In 1904 France awarded her with the Legion d’honor for her work spreading the word on French art to the United States.
Today, you can find more of her paintings in the United States than in France but when you do, enjoy her beautiful life's work.
