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Mary Cassatt at the Louvre: The Etruscan Gallery
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
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.
Cleveland Museum of Art’s own descriptionCredit lineMary Cassatt at the Louvre: The Etruscan Gallery, 1879–80. Edgar Degas (French, 1834–1917). Softground etching, drypoint, aquatint, and etching; platemark: 26.7 x 23.2 cm (10 1/2 x 9 1/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Charles W. Harkness Endowment Fund, 1929.877