In the Opera Box (No. 3) (Primary Title)
Mary Cassatt, American, 1844 - 1926 (Artist)
Following the critical success of Mary Cassatt’s entries at the Fourth Impressionist Exhibition, in 1879, Edgar Degas convinced the younger American to take up printmaking and contribute to a newly conceived art journal Le Jour et la nuit (Day and Night). Though the journal was never published, this print is one of fifty impressions that Cassatt produced for inclusion in an issue, joining similar works by fellow Impressionist peintres-gravures (painter-etchers) Degas and Camille Pissarro. Cassatt grounds the lower half of the print with a heavy application of dark aquatint and scratched lines that contrast with the receding, softly rendered arcs of the balconies at rear, reflected in a mirror behind the woman. Looking out at the spacious interior of the Paris Opera House, she is not only a spectator but also a part of the spectacle of fashionably attired women who attended these highly public occasions. Cassatt routinely depicted unaccompanied women who announced themselves as independent and modern even as they navigated the strict social mores of Parisian society.
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