MARY CASSATT AT WORK, Legion of Honor Art Museum, San Francisco, CA

A Kiss for Baby Ann, No. 3, 1897, pastel by Mary Cassatt. Legion of Honor Art Museum, San Francisco, CA.

Mary Cassatt, known for her sensitive paintings of women and children, was both the only American artist and only woman artist to exhibit with the Impressionists. In a stunning exhibit at the Legion of Honor Art Museum in San Francisco, the breadth of her work is displayed—drawings, prints, oil paintings and lustrous pastels. 

Woman in a Black Hat and Raspberry Pink Costume (detail), pastel, ca. 1905.

In December, when I was in the Bay Area, I went to the exhibit with my family. Although I was familiar with some of the paintings from my art history classes in college and from visits to other museums, I had never had the opportunity to see so many pieces up close and to appreciate Mary Cassatt’s work over the span of her lifetime (1844-1926).

Under the Lamp, aquatint and soft ground etching, 1883.

Before entering the galleries, we prepared ourselves by watching an excellent video playing in a room just inside the ticket area. (Timed tickets are required to see the exhibit.) In the video we learned about Mary Cassatt’s background as the daughter of a wealthy Philadelphia family. Like many young women of the time, she attended to art school. But unlike other young women who went on to become matrons of society, Mary Cassatt was determined to become a successful professional artist. She moved to Paris and pursued her career there. She never married.

At the Loge, 1878.

In the video, selected pieces of art were discussed by experts. We learned, for instance, to look carefully at the painting of the woman at the opera to see the gentlemen in the opposite box just as intently looking at her!

Portrait of Mrs. Robert S. Cassatt, the Artist's Mother, ca 1885. 

We also learned about Mary Cassatt’s relationships with her family, who initially disapproved of her art career. Later they joined her in France. Her mother and sister appear in some of her paintings.  Mary Cassatt also used paid models for her work.

Clarissa, Turned Right with her Hand to her Ear, 1890-1893, Pastel.

Detail.

While much of Mary Cassatt’s work is in oil paint, many of her most vibrant portraits are drawn with pastels. The advantage of pastels is that the color is pure pigment, not diluted with oil or another medium. A close-up look at her pastels reveals the freedom and looseness of the strokes and shimmer of the overlapping color. In contrast, the faces of her figures are more carefully modeled.

Prints, dry point and color aquatint.

I had not previously appreciated Mary Cassatt’s skill as a printmaker. In the exhibit we see examples of dry point engravings as well as aquatint prints. Cassatt believed that printmaking was the ultimate instructor in drawing. She said, "That is what teaches one to draw."

Family Group Reading (detail), 1898.

Many of the Impressionists focused on outdoor scenes in their paintings and worked in "plein air". While most of Mary Cassatt's art depicts of interior scenes, in some cases, as in Family Group Reading, she places her figures in an outdoor setting.

On a Balcony, 1878-79.

The most impressive thing about Mary Cassatt’s depictions of people is the expressions on the faces. She manages to capture their inner feelings and interpersonal connections. In Mother About to Wash a Sleepy Child, we sense the tenderness between mother and baby.

Mother About to Wash her Sleepy Child, 1880.

On the day of our visit, after viewing Mary Cassatt at Work, we ate a tasty lunch in the museum cafe, and then explored the permanent collection in the main floor galleries, ending in the room with paintings by Mary Cassatt's comrades in art--Monet, Manet, Renoir, Cezanne, Pissarro, Degas. Mary Cassatt at Work is an enlightening exhibit.  I gained a new appreciation of her as an innovator. I saw a talented woman who was determined to forge a career at a time when women were not encouraged to do so. If you don't get to see the Mary Cassatt exhibit at the Legion of Honor before it closes January 26, 2025, there are many other museums where you can see her work.

The Long Gloves, 1886. Pastel.

MANET AND MODERN BEAUTY at the Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA

Photo of French painter Edouard Manet (Frontispiece design by Eugene Grasset)

The late works of French painter, Edouard Manet (1832 - 1883), are currently on exhibit at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, California. Manet and Modern Beauty includes more than ninety works of art–paintings, drawings, pastels–providing a glimpse into the Manet’s incredible skill as a painter and to his life in his final years. I recently visited the exhibit. Some paintings were familiar, but many I had never seen before. In all, I was awed by his fluid brushstrokes, use of color, and ability to bring his subjects to life.

J. Paul Getty Museum, stairs to Manet Exhibit

As I climbed the stairs to the second floor of the exhibition building, I realized that the vertical portion of each step had been painted to create a giant image of Jeanne, the featured work of the exhibit and a recent acquisition by the Getty.

Jeanne (Spring) was exhibited at the 1882 Salon in Paris, along with Manet’s famous painting A Bar at the Folies-Bergere.

When Manet created the painting, also known as Spring, it was intended to be the first in a series depicting the seasons.The painting shows a beautiful young woman with a flowered bonnet and parasol surrounded by lush greenery. It is the essence of spring rather than a conventional depiction. The series was never completed. Autumn was the only other season Manet painted, and this painting was also in the exhibit--a figure against background inspired by a Japanese silk scarf decorated with a chrysanthemum motif--flowers that bloom in the fall.

Boating, 1881. This painting was begun after Manet began working with the Impressionists

The exhibit is divided into five sections. The first, La Vie Moderne, includes paintings that were first shown at a solo show in 1880 at a Parisian gallery that was connected to a new fashion and culture magazine called La Vie Moderne.

Plum Brandy, 1877

Many of those paintings depict portraits of women in bars and cabarets. Others were of friends and relations or members of Paris society, such as opera singer Emilie Ambre, who was Manet's neighbor in the summer and fall of 1880.

Portrait of Emilie Ambre as Carmen, 1990

The second section, Portraits of an Era includes various portraits, including an example of one he did in pastels. Between about 1878 and his death in 1883, the artist created nearly one hundred pastels, finding the process--which uses sticks of pure color--less demanding than painting.

Portrait of Madame Jules Guillemet, 1880, pastel on canvas

The third section of the exhibit, The Four Seasons, includes the picture of Jeanne, Autumn and others.
In Manet’s final years his health was failing. In 1880 he spent the summer at a spa in Bellevue getting treatments for the pain in his left leg.  The fourth section of the Getty exhibit, Manet at Bellevue, displays illustrated letters written to friends and colleagues from the spa.

Peaches, about 1880

The final section, Flowers, Fruit and Gardens, was one of my favorite parts of the exhibit. The paintings are small, but brilliantly executed, with the peaches in one seeming so real that you want to reach out and grab one to eat. Manet had many friends, and they often visited him, bringing flowers, which he then painted. His paintings of roses, lilacs and other flowers appear as fresh as the day they were picked. And the glass vases holding the flowers sparkle in the light.

Moss Roses in a Vase, about 1882

Manet has been called a “titan of modern art” by the director of the J. Paul Getty Museum. This exhibit is a showcase of his brilliance and mastery of the medium.

Plaza at J. Paul Getty Museum

Manet and Modern Beauty was co-organized by the J. Paul Getty Museum and the Art Institute of Chicago, and is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities. For more information about the exhibit and visiting the museum, click HERE.

DEGAS' Little Dancer and Works by ANDREW WYETH at the National Gallery, Washington, DC

Little Dancer Aged Fourteen, Original Wax Sculpture by Edgar Degas

On a recent trip to Washington, DC, I spent the morning at the National Gallery of Art, focusing on two of the current special exhibits, Degas’ Little Dancer Aged Fourteen, and a show of Andrew Wyeth paintings and drawings.  I have seen the Little Dancer by Degas several times before–in Paris, at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, and in another exhibit at the National Gallery–but they were all casts made after his death.  In this exhibit at the National Gallery is Degas’ original wax sculpture of the Little Dancer from which the casts were made so for the first time I could see how the surface was modeled.  The figure is made of wax over a metal armature to which the artist added wood, rope, and even old paintbrushes in the arms.  Then a wig of human hair was added as well as a cotton-and-silk tutu, a cotton faille bodice, and linen slippers. Her turned out toes, erect posture and raised chin seem to convey an inner determination. Little Dancer Aged Fourteen will be on view from October 5, 2014 to January 11, 2015.

Ballet Scene, Edgar Degas, Pastel

The Little Dancer was first exhibited in 1881 in Paris with other Impressionist works.  Fittingly, her surroundings at the National Gallery are paintings and drawings of other dancers by Degas, as well as works by other Impressionist and Post-Impressionist artists including Monet, Renoir, Van Gogh, and Cezanne. Many of the paintings are familiar from my art history classes but there were also some new ones such as Van Gogh's Green Wheat Fields, recently acquired by the museum. Van Gogh's characteristic layered brushstrokes pulsate across the surface of the painting.

Vincent van Gogh, Green Wheat Fields, Auvers, 1890

Another featured exhibit currently at the National Gallery is Andrew Wyeth: Looking Out, Looking In, which shows one of Wyeth’s  most famous paintings Wind from the Sea and explores his lifelong fascination with windows, a subject he depicted in more than three hundred works. Wyeth’s ability to paint the same subject over and over, each time seeing it in a new light and giving it new life is one of the pleasures of this exhibit.  Photographs were not allowed.  It will be on view until November 30, 2014.

Andrew Wyeth Exhibit at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

On our way to the two exhibits we passed many rooms of art that we didn’t have time to stop and view. The National Gallery is huge and impossible to see in one day. Our visit only encompassed the West Wing.  The East Wing galleries are currently closed for renovation.  On another trip we’ll go back to see more.

National Gallery of Art, West Wing