Mary Cassatt Research Paper

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Please turn each page of your packet into a paragraph. Mary Cassatt was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on May 22nd, 1844. She was one of seven siblings, two of which died during infancy. She was born into a wealthy family as her father, Robert, was a stock broker and land agent. Her mother, Katherine, also came from a wealthy banking family and was well educated. With this wealth, she grew up in a well educated environment. When Cassatt was around six years old, she moved eastward to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, then to Philadelphia area where she started schooling. Her family thought that traveling was important for their children’s education. Cassatt first moved to France then to Germany. The family had moved to Germany so that one son could …show more content…

As a result, her father would not pay for the costs to pursue her art career. With the support of her mother, Cassatt worked hard to appear in various exhibitions in order to continue her dream of becoming an artist. Not only did her father restrict her by making her pay for her own materials, as a woman, she did not have access to certain sources as many of her male peers had. Cassatt developed her painting skills and styles by learning from famous artists. Cassatt had many mentors such as Jean-Léon Gérôme and Thomas Couture. She was also influenced by many Japanese artists such as Kitagawa Utamaro. Kitagawa Utamaro’s artwork displayed simple modern shapes and is known for painting women with exaggerated and elongated features. This Japanese artist influenced her to printmaking and the use of basic shapes in her art pieces such as “The Bath”(1891). Mary Cassatt was influenced by the artist Edgar Degas and would often go to a local art dealer sometimes to stare at his pieces of artwork. One day, Degas himself asked if Cassatt would like to join his group of artists. The group included Claude Monet, Auguste Renoir, and Camille Pissarro. Degas encouraged her in her work by inviting Cassatt to meet other artists and see new paintings. During her many years of art, she would copy the work of other famous artworks and add details from those paintings in her own work. The deaths of her …show more content…

Cassatt then became one of the first woman ever to appear in the Paris salon. In 1870, Cassatt returned to the United States and continued her career in Brooklyn, where she struggled to make her way into the art world. While in the US, Cassatt tried selling her paintings in New York, but no one bought them. At around 1871, Cassatt finally got one of her paintings exhibited in Chicago, but it was then destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. Fortunately, her luck turned around and she was asked by the archbishop of Pittsburgh to copy two famous religious paintings by Correggio that were hanging in Parma, Italy. With this new job, Cassatt was able to return to Europe and be paid for her work. With this opportunity and cash now, Cassatt was able to stay in Europe to pursue her career. Cassatt’s painting of her mother, which to her surprise, her father liked, was exhibited in New York. This piece received high praise from art

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