A Portrait of the Artist's Mother

c. 1889-1890

Mary Cassatt

Artist, American, 1844 - 1926

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    softground etching and aquatint printed in brown on laid paper

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    plate: 25.24 × 17.94 cm (9 15/16 × 7 1/16 in.)
    sheet: 35.4 x 21.4 cm (13 15/16 x 8 7/16 in.)

  • Accession

    1949.5.467

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Mathews and Shapiro 1989, no. 4, iii/iv

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Harris Whittemore [1864-1927], Naugatuck, CT, 1919; (his sale, Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, 17 January 1949, no. 39); (Charles Sessler, Philadelphia, PA); purchased by Lessing J. Rosenwald, Jenkintown, PA, 1949; gift to the NGA, 1949.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1950

  • Prints by Mary Cassatt, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1950, no cat.

1963

  • American Artists as Print Makers, Westmoreland County Museum of Art, Greensburg, PA, 1963, no. 39.

1967

  • Miss Mary Cassatt: Paintings and Graphic Arts, Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, NY, 1967.

1989

  • Mary Cassatt: The Color Prints, National Gallery of Art, Washington; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Williams College Museum of Art, Williamston, MA, 1989-1990, no. 4-III, repro.

2025

  • Mary Cassatt at Work, Philadelphia Museum of Art; and Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, de Young, Legion of Honor, San Francisco, 2024-2025 (shown only in San Francisco).

Bibliography

1979

  • Breeskin, Adelyn Dohme. Mary Cassatt: A Catalogue Raisonné of the Graphic Work. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1979, no. 122, v/vii.

1989

  • Mathews, Nancy Mowll, and Barbara Stern Shapiro. Mary Cassatt: The Color Prints. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1989, no. 4, iii/iv.

2024

  • Thompson, Jennifer A. and Garber, Laurel, editors. Mary Cassatt at Work. Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, de Young, Legion of Honor, San Francisco; Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2024: 288.

Inscriptions

recto: at lower right in graphite: Mary Cassatt; verso: at lower left, in graphite, in later hand: A 91021; at lower right, in graphite, in later hand: FEO; at bottom right, in graphite, in later hand: 2928 / ern [?] / v.ax [?]

Watermarks

oval with seated figure holding a spear and shield, mounted by a crown

Wikidata ID

Q65081081

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