Mary Cassatt. The Child’s Bath, 1893. The Art Institute of Chicago, Robert A. Waller Fund. Photo by Robert Lifson, The Art Institute of Chicago.
The Art Institute of Chicago is presenting Mary Cassatt: After Impressionism, on view September 6, 2026 through January 3, 2027. The exhibition provides a focused look at the crucial moment in Cassatt’s career from the late 1880s to the early 1900s when this relentless experimenter took her art making in new directions.
During these pivotal years, Cassatt elevated her signature subject of women and children, exploring modernist aesthetics in series and across media. She centered modern women’s everyday lives in her art, making visible their intellectual and cultural pursuits in the larger world. Such vibrant portrayals are among Cassatt’s most celebrated compositions in her own time and today.
Mary Cassatt: After Impressionism brings together some of her most recognizable paintings, including the Art Institute’s own The Child’s Bath, alongside lesser known works, including her technically complex, luminous color prints that demonstrate the inspiration of Japanese woodcuts as well as her dedication to experimentation. The exhibition will gather more than 70 works from this moment in her career when she pushed beyond Impressionism and began dramatically exploring new subject matter, methods, and symbolism.
“I hope visitors will gain an understanding of Cassatt’s incredible finesse as a painter and a printmaker, and also recognize that her enduring investigation of women’s lives was, in itself, a daring move,” said Annelise K. Madsen, Gilda and Henry Buchbinder Curator, Arts of the Americas, at the Art Institute of Chicago. “This exhibition showcases her commitment to avant-garde expression, revealing the innovative ways that Cassatt transformed traditional subjects of femininity into extraordinary works of art.”
The exhibition will also tell the story of her mural, Modern Woman, an unprecedented assignment for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. The monumental canvas was one of the earliest public commissions for a mural painting by a female artist in the United States. Using bold aesthetics and celebrating female achievement, Cassatt captivated audiences with her assertive vision, drawing admiration as well as criticism. The mural is presumed to be destroyed, but the Art Institute has extensive archives from the project, including letters, fair publications, photographs, and other ephemera that will be on full display.
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Mary Cassatt: After Impressionism is curated by Annelise K. Madsen, Gilda and Henry Buchbinder Curator, Arts of the Americas, Art Institute of Chicago.
An illustrated catalogue accompanies the exhibition, featuring essays on Cassatt’s adventurous work in this period by Madsen; Gillian Marcus, associate conservator at the Newberry Library; and Nicole R. Myers, chief curatorial and research officer and the Barbara Thomas Lemmon Senior Curator of European Art at the Dallas Museum of Art.
