This new exhibit just opened at the Art Institute on Friday for members’ preview, and I marked my calendar to be sure to attend on Saturday, like in the old days, when I was always the first to see the newly opened exhibit.
As it often happens, it was a new discovery. Although I saw “The Child’s Bath” in the permanent exhibit as many times as I visited the Art Institute, it was “one of many Impressionist paintings”, and I was absolutely sure that Mary Cassatt was French!
Not only was she American, but she lived in Chicago before moving to France, and she witnessed the Great Chicago Fire!
And then it happened. Chicago was awarded the honor of hosting the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893, and Mrs. Bertha Palmer headed the efforts to organize the Woman’s Building and the at the Fair, and for this building, she commissioned two murals: The Primitive Woman and the Modern Woman. The latter one was commissioned to Mary Cassatt.
She worked on this mural in France, and when it was ready, she shipped it to Chicago where it was mounted at the Women’s building Hall of Honor.
Once again, what can be so revolutionary, so scandalous in women picking fruits? Still the critics called the art too brutal, too vulgar, and unprudent. She was not disturbed, and continued working on her paintings. incorporationg the elements of the mural into her other works.
And then we lost it! After the Exibition closed, the mural was dismounted and put into storage. And nobody ever so it since 1912! It’s so unfair! However, it looks like Mary Cassatt herself didn’t care much about it. She was done with that project, and kept working.
Hettie's Reflections 