Mary Cassatt — The Bath

The one she herself labelled an imitation. The other nine she did not.

The document

A woman in a yellow sprigged dress kneels and lowers a naked child towards a deep blue basin, testing the water with one hand. The blue of the basin is the only saturated area in the sheet and it anchors everything. In the catalogue of her 1891 exhibition this plate carried a designation the other nine did not: Essai d'imitation de l'estampe japonaise, an attempt at imitating the Japanese print. It is her own label, on her own work, and it makes this the first sheet of the series in every sense.

The pencil at the bottom. Under the plate mark, in Cassatt's own hand: Imprimée par l'artiste et M. Leroy — Mary Cassatt — (25 épreuves). Printed by the artist and M. Leroy, twenty-five impressions. The Japanese sheets she had been studying carried the printer's name beside the artist's, and she did the same. It is reproduced here because it is part of the object.

About the artist

Mary Cassatt (1844–1926) was born in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania, and spent her working life in France. She was the only American invited to exhibit with the Impressionists. In April 1890 she saw an exhibition of 725 Japanese prints at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, wrote to Berthe Morisot telling her not to miss it, and spent the following year teaching herself to do in copper what she had seen done in woodblock. She printed the results herself, at the press, alongside a professional printer, and signed each sheet in pencil.

The print

Printed to order and made to last. Choose Museum Matte (heavyweight matte art paper) or Fine Art Giclée (Hahnemühle cotton paper — the archival standard). The Métrica museum caption — artist, title, date and source — is printed as part of the piece, set in our house type. Free US shipping on orders over $75.

Mary Cassatt, The Bath, colour aquatint with burnishing, drypoint and softground, 1890–91. The Art Institute of Chicago, 1932.1287. Public domain.

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