Editing Mary Cassatt (section)

==Early life==
[[File:Young Woman in a Black and Green Bonnet, Looking Down.jpg|thumb|left|''Young Woman in a Black and Green Bonnet'', {{Circa|1890}}, [[Princeton University Art Museum]]]]

Cassatt was born in [[Allegheny, Pennsylvania|Allegheny City]], [[Pennsylvania]], which is now part of [[Pittsburgh]].<ref name="Columbus Museum of Art p.36">{{cite book |last = Roberts |first = Norma J. |title = The American Collections |publisher = [[Columbus Museum of Art]] |year = 1988 |location = Columbus |isbn = 978-0-918881-20-5 |page = [https://archive.org/details/americancollecti0000colu/page/36 36] |url = https://archive.org/details/americancollecti0000colu/page/36 }}</ref> She was born into an [[Upper middle class|upper-middle-class]] family:{{sfn|Pollock|1998|p=280}} Her father, Robert Simpson Cassat (later Cassatt), was a successful stockbroker and land speculator. The ancestral name had been Cossart, with the family descended from French [[Huguenot]] Jacques Cossart, who came to [[New Amsterdam]] in 1662.{{sfn|Mathews|1998|p=3}}<ref name=americanwoman>{{cite book|last=Rubinstein|first=Charlotte Streifer|title=American women artists: from early Indian times to the present|url=https://archive.org/details/americanwomenart09rubi|url-access=registration|year=1982|publisher=Hall |location=Boston, Mass. |isbn=978-0816185351}}</ref> Her mother, Katherine Kelso Johnston, came from a banking family. Katherine Cassatt, educated and well-read, had a profound influence on her daughter.{{sfn|Pollock|1998|pp=281–82}} To that effect, Cassatt's lifelong friend [[Louisine Havemeyer]] wrote in her memoirs: "Anyone who had the privilege of knowing Mary Cassatt's mother would know at once that it was from her and her alone that [Mary] inherited her ability."<ref>Havemeyer, Louisine (1961). ''Sixteen to Sixty: Memoirs of a Collector.'' New York: Priv. Print. for the family of Mrs. H.O. Havemeyer and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. p. 272.</ref> A distant cousin of artist [[Robert Henri]],<ref>{{cite book |last=Perlman |first=Bennard B. |title=Robert Henri: His Life and Art |url= https://archive.org/details/roberthenrihisli0000perl |url-access=registration | page=[https://archive.org/details/roberthenrihisli0000perl/page/1 1] |location=New York | publisher= Dover Publications |year=1991 | isbn= 978-0-486-26722-7}}</ref> Cassatt was one of seven children, of whom two died in infancy. One brother, [[Alexander Cassatt|Alexander Johnston Cassatt]], later became president of the [[Pennsylvania Railroad]]. The family moved eastward, first moving to [[Lancaster, Pennsylvania]], then to the [[Philadelphia]] area, where she started her schooling at the age of six.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web|url=http://www.marycassatt.org/biography.html|title=Mary Cassatt - The Complete Works - Biography - marycassatt.org|website=www.marycassatt.org|access-date=November 19, 2019}}</ref>

Cassatt grew up in an environment that viewed travel as an integral part of a well-rounded education; she spent five years in Europe and visited many of the capitals, including London, Paris, and Berlin. While abroad she learned German and French and had her first lessons in drawing and music.{{sfn|Mathews|1998|p=11}} It is likely that her first exposure to French artists [[Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres]], [[Eugène Delacroix]], [[Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot|Camille Corot]], and [[Gustave Courbet]] was at the [[Paris World's Fair]] of 1855.  Also in the exhibition were [[Edgar Degas]] and [[Camille Pissarro]], both of whom were later her colleagues and mentors.{{sfn|McKown|1972|pp=10–12}}

Though her family objected to her becoming a professional artist, Cassatt began studying painting at the [[Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts]] in Philadelphia at the early age of 15.{{sfn|Mathews|1998|p=15}}<ref name="Presutti–2024">{{cite news |author=Presutti |first=Kelly |date=April 29, 2024 |title=Who Was Mary Cassatt and Why Was She So Important? |url=https://www.artnews.com/list/art-news/artists/who-was-mary-cassatt-impressionist-painter-1234704091/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240429181454/https://www.artnews.com/list/art-news/artists/who-was-mary-cassatt-impressionist-painter-1234704091/ |archive-date=April 29, 2024 |work=[[ARTnews]]}}</ref>  Part of her parents' concern may have been Cassatt's exposure to [[Feminism|feminist]] ideas and the bohemian behavior of some of the male students. As such, Cassatt and her network of friends were lifelong advocates of [[Equal rights for women|equal rights]] for the sexes.<ref name=":0"/> Although about 20% of the students were female, most viewed art as a socially valuable skill; few of them were determined, as Cassatt was, to make art their career.{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=18}} She continued her studies from 1861 through 1865, the duration of the [[American Civil War]].<ref name="Columbus Museum of Art p.36" /> [[Thomas Eakins]] was among her fellow students; later Eakins was forced to resign as director of the academy.<ref name=":1" />

Impatient with the slow pace of instruction and the patronizing attitude of the male students and teachers, she decided to study the [[Old Master|old masters]] on her own. She later said: "There was no teaching" at the academy. Female students could not use live models, until somewhat later, and the principal training was primarily drawing from casts.{{sfn|McKown|1972|p=16}}

Cassatt decided to end her studies: At that time, no degree was granted. After overcoming her father's objections, she moved to Paris in 1866, with her mother and family friends acting as [[chaperone (social)|chaperone]]s.{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=29}} Since women could not yet attend the [[École des Beaux-Arts]], Cassatt applied to study privately with masters from the school{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=31}} and was accepted to study with [[Jean-Léon Gérôme]], a highly regarded teacher known for his hyper-realistic technique and his depiction of exotic subjects. (A few months later Gérôme also accepted Eakins as a student.{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=31}}) Cassatt augmented her artistic training with daily copying in the [[Louvre]], obtaining the required permit, which was necessary to control the "copyists", usually low-paid women, who daily filled the museum to paint copies for sale. The museum also served as a social place for Frenchmen and American female students, who, like Cassatt, were not allowed to attend [[Coffeehouse|cafes]] where the avant-garde socialized. In this manner, fellow artist and friend [[Elizabeth Jane Gardner]] met and married famed academic painter [[William-Adolphe Bouguereau]].{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=32}}

[[Image:Mary Cassatt - The Boating Party - Google Art Project.jpg|thumb|right|275px|''[[The Boating Party]]'' by Mary Cassatt, 1893–94, oil on canvas, 35½ × 46 in., [[National Gallery of Art, Washington]]]]

Toward the end of 1866, she joined a painting class taught by [[Charles Joshua Chaplin]], a [[genre art]]ist. In 1868, Cassatt also studied with artist [[Thomas Couture]], whose subjects were mostly romantic and urban.{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=54}} On trips to the countryside, the students drew from life, particularly the peasants going about their daily activities. In 1868, one of her paintings, ''A Mandoline Player'', was accepted for the first time by the selection jury for the [[Paris Salon]]. With [[Elizabeth Jane Gardner]], whose work was also accepted by the jury that year, Cassatt was one of two American women to first exhibit in the Salon.<ref name=americanwoman/> ''A Mandoline Player'' is in the [[Romanticism|Romantic]] style of [[Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot|Corot]] and Couture,{{sfn|Mathews|1998|p=47}} and is one of only two paintings from the first decade of her career that is documented today.{{sfn|Mathews|1998|p=54}}

The French art scene was in a process of change, as radical artists such as Courbet and [[Édouard Manet]] tried to break away from accepted Academic tradition, and the Impressionists were in their formative years. Cassatt's friend Eliza Haldeman wrote home that artists "are leaving the Academy style and each seeking a new way, consequently just now everything is Chaos."{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=32}} Cassatt, on the other hand, continued to work in the traditional manner, submitting works to the Salon for over ten years, with increasing frustration.

Returning to the United States in the late summer of 1870—as the [[Franco-Prussian War]] was starting<ref name=Presutti–2024 />—Cassatt lived with her family in [[Altoona, Pennsylvania|Altoona]]. Her father continued to resist her chosen vocation, and paid for her basic needs, but not her art supplies.{{sfn|Mathews|1998|p=75}} Cassatt placed two of her paintings in a New York gallery and found many admirers but no purchasers. She was also dismayed at the lack of paintings to study while staying at her summer residence. Cassatt even considered giving up art, as she was determined to make an independent living. She wrote in a letter of July 1871, "I have given up my studio & torn up my father's portrait, & have not touched a brush for six weeks nor ever will again until I see some prospect of getting back to Europe. I am very anxious to go out west next fall & get some employment, but I have not yet decided where."{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=74}}

Cassatt traveled to Chicago to try her luck, but lost some of her early paintings in the [[Great Chicago Fire]] of 1871.{{sfn|McKown|1972|p=36}} Shortly afterward, her work attracted the attention of Roman Catholic Bishop [[Michael Domenec]] of Pittsburgh, who commissioned her to paint two copies of paintings by [[Correggio]] in [[Parma]], Italy, advancing her enough money to cover her travel expenses and part of her stay.<ref>{{Cite web |last=MacPherson |first=Karen |date=June 20, 1999 |url=http://old.post-gazette.com/magazine/19990620cassatt5.asp |title=Lasting impressions: National Gallery exhibition displays different hues of Mary Cassatt |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210125204727/http://old.post-gazette.com/magazine/19990620cassatt5.asp |archive-date=January 25, 2021 |work=Post-gazette.com |access-date=June 23, 2020}}</ref> In her excitement she wrote, "O how wild I am to get to work, my fingers farely itch & my eyes water to see a fine picture again".{{sfn|Mathews|1994|p=76}} With [[Emily Sartain]], a fellow artist from a well-regarded artistic family from Philadelphia, Cassatt set out for Europe again.