Woman in a Black Hat and a Raspberry Pink Costume 1900

Mary Cassatt made this pastel drawing of a woman in fashionable attire sometime in the late 19th century, a period when the institutions of art were opening up to women, both as artists and subjects. The image presents a bourgeois woman, likely Parisian, in a raspberry pink costume. The black hat provides a visual contrast, drawing attention to her face and refined features. Cassatt, an American artist working among the Impressionists in France, often depicted women in domestic and social settings. This aligns with the Impressionist focus on modern life, but Cassatt's work also subtly challenged the male gaze prevalent at the time. By focusing on the inner lives and social roles of women, Cassatt offered a counter-narrative to the objectification of women in art. Detailed research into fashion history and the social conventions of the time would further reveal Cassatt's commentary on the social structures of her era, making her work invaluable to cultural historians.