Cleveland Museum of Art

Mary Cassatt at the Louvre: The Etruscan Gallery

Edgar Degas

Date

1879–80

Medium

softground etching, drypoint, aquatint, and etching

Culture

France, 19th century

Department

Prints

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

This print is one of two in which Edgar Degas depicted Mary Cassatt and her sister Lydia at the Musée du Louvre. In this iteration of the subject, Casatt gazes intently at an Etruscan tomb, about 500 BC, excavated at Cerveteri, the largest ancient necropolis in the Mediterranean. Cassatt is viewed from behind while the enigmatically smiling couple, lying on top of a sarcophagus and enclosed in a glass case, face the viewer. Cassatt confronts the sculpture directly while Lydia reads about it in a guidebook.

The authoritative record is held by Cleveland Museum of Art. LinkedCulture surfaces this object and its connections; it does not alter institutional metadata.