The Loge
Sul dipinto
Giovani donne nel palco è un dipinto a olio su tela (80x64 cm) realizzato nel 1882 dalla pittrice Mary Cassatt.
È conservato nella National Gallery di Washington.
Il dipinto ritrae Geneviève Mallarmé (sulla destra), figlia del poeta simbolista Stéphane Mallarmé, in compagnia di Mary Eleison (a sinistra), un'amica statunitense, mentre siedono in un palco di un teatro parigino.
I colori sono chiari e luminosi e richiamano l'interno del teatro stesso: quasi sicuramente il dipinto non è stato fatto in loco ma in studio. Geneviève è raffigurata con un bouquet fiorito in mano, mentre Mary ha un grande ventaglio che le copre parte del viso e il décolleté.
Come in altri quadri impressionisti, il pubblico teatrale è spesso soggetto delle raffigurazioni pittoriche: anche la Cassatt vi dedicò diversi lavori.
Scheda
- Numero di inventario
- 1963.10.96
Nel frattempo, nella vita di Mary Cassatt
Tutta la vita1877
Meets Degas and is invited to join the Impressionists
Edgar Degas, whose pastels had once changed how she saw art, invites Mary to show her work with the Impressionists. At last she could work quite independently, without worrying about the jury’s judgement.
1877
The Salon rejects both of her pictures
In 1877 the jury rejects both of her entries, and for the first time in seven years she has no work in the Salon. It is the low point of her career.
10 April 1879
The 1879 Impressionist exhibition
Mary shows eleven works, among them “Lydia in a Loge, Wearing a Pearl Necklace”; critics call her colours too bright and her portraits too accurate, yet her work is not savaged as Monet’s is. The show, organised and underwritten by Gustave Caillebotte, is the group’s most successful to date and turns a profit.
autumn 1879 – winter 1880
Printmaking in Degas’s studio
Degas introduces Mary to etching: he owns a small printing press, and by day she works in his studio with his tools and press while in the evening she makes studies for the next day’s plate. It is when the two work most closely together, on a planned journal of prints.
1880–1881
The Impressionist exhibitions of 1880 and 1881
Mary takes part in the next two Impressionist exhibitions and remains an active member of the circle until 1886. The only American officially associated with the group, she would go on to exhibit in half of its later shows.
