Baby's Back, Mary Cassatt

Artwork Overview

Mary Cassatt, Baby's Back
Mary Cassatt, Baby's Back
Mary Cassatt
Baby's Back
1890
Mary Cassatt
1844–1926
Baby's Back, 1890
Where object was made: France
Material/technique: laid paper; soft-ground etching; drypoint
Dimensions:
Image Dimensions Height/Width (Height x Width): 234 x 164 mm
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 347 x 210 mm
Image Dimensions Height/Width (Height x Width): 9 3/16 x 6 7/16 in
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 13 11/16 x 8 1/4 in
Mat Dimensions (Height x Width): 19 x 14 in
Credit line: Bequest of George and Annette Cross Murphy
Accession number: 1989.0178
Not on display
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Exhibition Label: "American Etchers Abroad, 1880-1939," Apr-2004, Reed Anderson Cassatt produced an important series of twelve drypoints that were first exhibited in her 1893 exhibition at Durand-Ruel’s gallery in Paris. "Baby’s Back" belongs to this set and, like other works in the series, Cassatt’s chosen subject is a woman, her child, and the warm emotional bond they share. The figures are rendered entirely in lines of various widths and depths that underscore Cassatt’s expertise as a draftsman. The dark drypoint line that delineates the child’s back calls to mind the surface of the human body, the touch of a baby’s soft skin. As one scholar has noted, subjects like this, which employed living models, could be difficult to complete, since children could not be expected to hold a pose for long.