The Letter

1890-1891

Mary Cassatt

Artist, American, 1844 - 1926

We look slightly down onto a young woman sitting at a writing desk as she licks an envelope in this vertical, color print. A table folds down or extends from a tall secretary desk to our right. The blotter on the table and the woman’s long dress are both royal blue. The dress has a vaguely floral pattern in tan, and the jacket is open to reveal a vertically pleated, beige-pink shirt beneath. The woman’s skin is faintly tinted almost yellow. Her black hair is pulled back over dark brows and a delicate nose. She holds the open flap of the envelope to her mouth with both hands. A piece of white paper lies on the desktop in front of her. She sits in a brown chair, and the wallpaper of the room is patterned with green and muted brown flowers against a white background. The sheet is inscribed with graphite across the right half of the bottom margin, “Edition de 25 épreuves Imprimée par l'artiste et M. Leroy Mary Cassatt.”

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    color drypoint and aquatint on laid paper

  • Credit Line

    Chester Dale Collection

  • Dimensions

    plate: 34.6 x 22.8 cm (13 5/8 x 9 in.)
    sheet: 43.6 x 30.3 cm (17 3/16 x 11 15/16 in.)

  • Accession

    1963.10.251

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Mathews and Shapiro 1989, no. 8, iv/iv

Artwork history & notes

Exhibition History

1936

  • Mary Cassatt, Baltimore Museum of Art, MD, 1936, no. 26.

1965

  • Graphic Arts from the Chester Dale Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965.

1966

  • Master Prints from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1966 - 1967.

1967

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

1970

  • Mary Cassatt, 1844-1926, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1970.

  • Prints from the Rosenwald Collection, Charleston Art Gallery, Charleston, WV, 1970.

1977

  • Prints of Paris: The 1890s, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1977.

1983

  • Graphic Survey Show, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., May 1983.

1995

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

1998

  • Mary Cassatt: Modern Woman, The Art Institute of Chicago; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1998-1999, no. 59 (shown only in Washington).

Bibliography

1979

  • Breeskin, Adelyn Dohme. Mary Cassatt: A Catalogue Raisonné of the Graphic Work. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1979, no. 146, iii/iii.

1989

  • Mathews, Nancy Mowll, and Barbara Stern Shapiro. Mary Cassatt: The Color Prints. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1989, no. 8, iv/iv.

1994

  • Mathews, Nancy Mowll. Mary Cassatt: A Life. New York, 1994: 196, fig. 85.

1997

  • Hughes, Robert. _ American Visions: The Epic History of Art in America_. New York, 1997:259, color fig. 155.

1998

  • Mary Cassatt: Modern Woman. Exh. cat. The Art Institute of Chicago; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1998-1999: 84, no. 59.

Inscriptions

lower right in graphite: Edition de 25 épreuves Imprimée par l'artiste et M. Leroy / Mary Cassatt

Wikidata ID

Q65511207

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