Full Description
"You'll never look at Cassatt the same way again."—A Hyperallergic Favorite Art Book of 2025
"An authoritative, beautifully illustrated study."—Kirkus Reviews
The first comprehensive study of Cassatt's life, work, and legacy through the prism of a transatlantic framework.
This book re-envisions Mary Cassatt in the context of her transatlantic network, friendships, exhibitions, politics, and legacy. Rather than defining her as either an American artist or a French impressionist, author Ruth E. Iskin argues that we can best understand Cassatt through the complexity of her multiple identifications as an American patriot, a committed French impressionist, and a suffragist.
Contextualizing Cassatt's feminist outlook within the intense pro- and anti-suffrage debates in the United States, Iskin shows how these impacted her artistic representations of motherhood, fatherhood, and older women. Mary Cassatt between Paris and New York also argues for the historical importance of her work as an advisor to American collectors, and demonstrates the role of museums in shaping her legacy, highlighting the combined impact of gender, national, and transnational dynamics.
Contents
Contents
Preface and Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. Cassatt's Transatlantic Network
2. Cassatt and Louisine Havemeyer: Collaboration, Suffrage, Alliance, and Affective Bond
3. Cassatt and Degas: Camaraderie, Conflict, and Legacy
4. Cassatt's Transatlantic Feminism
5. Cassatt's Art and the Suffrage Debates of Her Time
6. The 1915 Cassatt and Degas Exhibition in New York
7. Cassatt's Legacy: Art Museums and National Identity
Abbreviations
Notes
Selected Bibliography
List of Illustrations
Index
