by Vanessa Schmitz-Grucker
While her works with a palette considered too bright were rejected by the Paris Salon, in 1879, Degas invited Mary Cassatt to participate in the fourth “Exhibition of Impressionist Painters”. There she exhibited her Lydia dans une loge, portant un collier de perles (Lydia in a Dressing Room, Wearing a Pearl Necklace ) ( Philadelphia MBA ). Lydia, her sister, had just moved to Paris, already cognizant of her liver disease. During the years over which this study was created, Mary’s older sister came to be at the heart of her work. It is Lydia’s profile that is sketched in this study…
