Dream Woman 

Alice Pike Barney created "Dream Woman" using delicate strokes of pastel on paper. The powdery nature of pastel lends itself to soft, ethereal effects, perfectly capturing the dreamlike quality of the subject. Barney, born into a wealthy family, had the privilege to pursue artistic training at a time when opportunities for women were limited. Her choice of pastels—seen by some as a less 'serious' medium than oil paint—might be interpreted as a subtle act of defiance, a way of embracing a delicate, traditionally feminine material to create powerful and evocative imagery. The process of layering pastel, blending colors with fingers or a blending stump, requires a sensitivity to the material. It is an intimate act, building up the image slowly, almost breathlessly. In "Dream Woman," this technique produces a hazy, indistinct figure, a vision that seems to emerge from the very surface of the paper. This artwork reminds us that the value and impact of a work lies not just in the image it presents, but in the artist's engagement with the materials and processes that bring it to life.