Still, these depictions of Cassatt, despite having her personal disapproval, were not entirely inaccurate. Caught between an opportunity for a public life and the backlash that would result of being a public, unmarried working upper class woman, Cassatt often had images that included women in public with senses of judiciousness and trepidation. For example, in the painting In the Omnibus (Color Print. 1891; Figure 8), Cassatt contrasts the differences between the guarded, middle class woman who seems nervous over getting caught doing something this unfashionable against a working class woman and her child who is blissfully evading that social parameter. This painting, therefore, can be read and appreciated by multiple audiences once more.
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While the previously mentioned interferences of upper middle class women being able to have a free social life might’ve contributed to the narrow feminine focus in paintings, even the domestic paintings appear to serve a purpose. Norma Broude notes that in most of images of “women going about….daily domestic lives” there is “a strange ambiguity of meaning and mood and intention, a challenging resistance to any singular interpretation”. Mary Cassatt was probably creating the intentional, subtle atmosphere of confusion to reflect the social constructs and constriction of being a woman in a world that is caught between progress and resistance. Did Mary Cassatt paint these pictures for critical fame and success, fiscal success and certainty or to make a …show more content…
Here, she depicts the modern woman free to pursue three different objectives: fame, art, and knowledge. The mural did not contain a male, which made it a critical dud. In the Fame section, a nude female child leads young girls to join her up in the air and take flight. This could be construed as a diss towards finding love, as the imagery is very reminiscent of girls being in the “flight of love” in Pompeii paintings. In the Art section, women pursue arts, dance and music. However, the most notable one by far is the center one: Young Women Plucking the Fruits of Knowledge and Science. Women, here, are seen doing physical labor outside as they pick and pass on the fruits of knowledge to the younger generations. Here, Cassatt takes the sinful story of the apple and Eve and mollifies it into something more charming and innocent with the young woman. There’s also a noted irony, in the sense that women ate the fruit of knowledge first and introduced it to the man and yet are unable to enjoy technologies and are critically underrated in their intelligence. This, coupled with the context of the divisive issue in Cassatt’s day of women’s education, could be seen as a very provocative statement in favor of women receiving an education. Indeed, when looking at this mural in the context of Mary Cassatt’s own life, her
While the previously mentioned interferences of upper middle class women being able to have a free social life might’ve contributed to the narrow feminine focus in paintings, even the domestic paintings appear to serve a purpose. Norma Broude notes that in most of images of “women going about….daily domestic lives” there is “a strange ambiguity of meaning and mood and intention, a challenging resistance to any singular interpretation”. Mary Cassatt was probably creating the intentional, subtle atmosphere of confusion to reflect the social constructs and constriction of being a woman in a world that is caught between progress and resistance. Did Mary Cassatt paint these pictures for critical fame and success, fiscal success and certainty or to make a …show more content…
Here, she depicts the modern woman free to pursue three different objectives: fame, art, and knowledge. The mural did not contain a male, which made it a critical dud. In the Fame section, a nude female child leads young girls to join her up in the air and take flight. This could be construed as a diss towards finding love, as the imagery is very reminiscent of girls being in the “flight of love” in Pompeii paintings. In the Art section, women pursue arts, dance and music. However, the most notable one by far is the center one: Young Women Plucking the Fruits of Knowledge and Science. Women, here, are seen doing physical labor outside as they pick and pass on the fruits of knowledge to the younger generations. Here, Cassatt takes the sinful story of the apple and Eve and mollifies it into something more charming and innocent with the young woman. There’s also a noted irony, in the sense that women ate the fruit of knowledge first and introduced it to the man and yet are unable to enjoy technologies and are critically underrated in their intelligence. This, coupled with the context of the divisive issue in Cassatt’s day of women’s education, could be seen as a very provocative statement in favor of women receiving an education. Indeed, when looking at this mural in the context of Mary Cassatt’s own life, her