A Portrait of the Artist's Mother

c. 1889-1890

Mary Cassatt

Associated Names
Mary Cassatt

Artist, American, 1844 - 1926

This print shows an elderly woman seated, slightly angled to the left, with her head resting on her hand. Her facial features are soft, and she has beige skin and her hair is gray and pulled back neatly. She is wearing a high-collared black dress and a light-colored shawl over her shoulders. The background is a muted brown with green and yellow floral decorations suggesting bouquets of green and yellow flowers placed on either side of her.

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    color softground etching and aquatint on laid paper

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    plate: 25.24 × 17.94 cm (9 15/16 × 7 1/16 in.)
    sheet: 35.2 x 21 cm (13 7/8 x 8 1/4 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1946.21.90

  • Catalogue Raisonné

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

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Robert Hartshorne (1866-1927), New Jersey (Lugt 2215b); (sale, Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, 23 January 1946, lot 68); Lessing J. Rosenwald, Jenkintown, PA; acquired 1946 by the National Gallery of Art

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1946

  • New Acquisitions in the Rosenwald Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1946.

1950

  • Prints by Mary Cassatt. Rosenwald Collection and gift of Miss Elisabeth Achelis, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1950.

1958

  • Color Etchings and Aquatints by Mary Cassatt, Ogunquit Museum, ME, 1958.

1963

  • Prints and Drawings by Mary Cassatt, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1963.

1964

  • Prints by Mary Cassatt, organized by the Smithsonian Travelling Exhibition Service and circulated to 10 venues (Vassar College Art Gallery, Poughkeepsie, NY; Norton Gallery & School of Art, Palm Beach, FL; University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor, MI; Wichita Art Museum, Wichita, KS; Charles & Emma Frye Art Museum, Seattle, WA; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN; Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, NH; Columbus Gallery of Fine Art, Columbus, OH; Allentown Art Museum, Allentown, PA; and A.D. White Museum of Art at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY), 1964-1965.

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-IV, repro.

1995

  • Prints by James McNeill Whistler and His Contemporaries, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1995.

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), no repro.

  • Mary Cassatt / Berthe Morisot: Allies in Impressionism, Fenimore Museum of Art, Cooperstown, NY, 2025, no cat. number, repro.

Bibliography

1979

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

1989

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

1996

  • Mathews, Nancy Mowll. Cassatt: A Retrospective. New York: H.L. Levin Associates, 1996, p. 165.

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.

2025

  • Mathews, Nancy Mowll, and Cannon, Ann. Mary Cassatt / Berthe Morisot: Allies in Impressionism. Exh.cat. Fenimore Art Museum, Cooperstown, NY, 2025:61, repro.

Inscriptions

recto: below image, at right, in graphite: Mary Cassatt; along bottom edge, in graphite, in later hand: 2 NY 609 H. H. moa; verso: at lower right, in graphite, in later hand: 13

Markings

recto: none; verso: Robert Hartshorne (Lugt 2215b)

Watermarks

ANDERLEY

Wikidata ID

Q65081041

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