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| Mary Cassatt Self Portrait 1878 gouache on paper Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
"In Mary Cassatt's life there were notable contradictions. As a painter she was allied with the most avant-garde group of professional artists of the time: becoming dissatisfied early in her career with the reactionary Salon painters, she had enthusiastically joined the Impressionists, once Degas invited her, and for the rest of her life shunned "establishment" associations of artists. Yet she lived in the bosom of her family in Paris, exactly like any well-bred Philadelphia lady; the Cassatt household was the essence of respectability wherever it was located. Louisine Elder often visited the Cassatts in Paris; she was greatly impressed with Mary's concern for her home and family, which followed the Victorian code, as Louisine later observed: 'Her life ever after the Cassatts' arrival was an example of devotion to duty! She held duty high before her as a pilgrim would his cross. No sacrifice was too great for her to make for her family – or for her friends.'"
"It was precisely this dual aspect of Mary Cassatt's personality that appealed to strongly to the young Miss Elder. Louisine was attracted by her friend's example, which showed one could have originality of taste and opinion within the sphere of respectability; this corresponded to Louisine's own ideal and she herself developed exactly along these lines. Mary Cassatt was not simply her art mentor but her model in a personal sense as well. Both women were of impeccable background and lived and dressed accordingly. Louisine took pride in the ladylike appearance of her artist-friend: 'Miss Cassatt's tall figure which she inherited from her father, had distinction and elegance and there was no trace of artistic negligence or carelessness which some painters affect. Once having seen her, you could never forget her from her remarkable small foot, to the plumed hat with the inevitable tip upon her head and the Brussels lace veil, without which she was never seen.' If either had been in the least bohemian, she would have horrified the other."
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| Mary Cassatt Girl arranging her hair 1886 oil on canvas National Gallery of Art, Washington DC formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
"During the war Cassatt had asked the Durand-Ruels to safeguard three of her works by Degas: a pastel of a nude in a tub, a bust-length portrait of a young woman, and a silk fan with dancers. In 1917 she sold all three for $20,000 to Louisine, and George Durand-Ruel had them shipped to New York six months after the armistice. When her sister-in-law Lois (Alexander's widow) died early in 1920 and one of their three children began to dispose of his share of the family's pictures, Cassatt felt more than justified in having channeled her holdings by Degas into the Havemeyer collection. She confided to Louisine: 'How glad I am you have the Degas, it is a relief & I must sell my only remaining [Cassatt] picture, then there will be nothing left.'"
"Louisine was delighted to own the works by Degas that had belonged to Mary Cassatt. Her knowledge that she would eventually obtain them had probably kept her from bidding in 1918 and 1919 during the four sales of the contents of Degas's studio. Cassatt was, moreover, not impressed by what was being auctioned, as she commented to her friend in May 1918: 'I send with this the account of the first day's sale of Degas atelier. The prices were high, for there was nothing of his best, when one thinks of how nobody would buy when you first began! But that is the way with everything.' Cassatt also assured Louisine that her nude woman in a tub was far superior to any of the less finished nudes found in Degas's studio. Out of the first two auctions of Degas's own impressive collection, however, comprising works principally by nineteenth-century artists from Ingres to Van Gogh, Louisine had made one purchase: Cassatt's intricately posed Girl Arranging Her Hair, for which Joseph Durand-Ruel paid about $4,600 on her behalf. This was the very painting which Degas had exchanged with Cassatt for his pastel of the nude in a tub."
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| Mary Cassatt Peasant Mother and Child ca. 1894 drypoint and aquatint printed in color Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Barefooted Child ca. 1896-97 drypoint and aquatint printed in color Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Mother and Child (The Oval Mirror) ca. 1899 oil on canvas Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Family Group Reading 1898 oil on canvas Philadelphia Museum of Art formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Mother wearing a Sunflower ca. 1905 oil on canvas National Gallery of Art, Washington DC formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Feeding the Ducks ca. 1894 drypoint, etching and aquatint printed in color Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Young Mother Sewing 1900 oil on canvas Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Mother and Sleeping Child 1914 pastel Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Mother and Child 1914 pastel Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Portrait of Adaline Havemeyer 1898-99 pastel Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Portrait of Mrs Havemeyer and her daughter Electra 1895 pastel private collection formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
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| Mary Cassatt Portrait of Louisine W. Havemeyer 1896 pastel Shelburne Museum, Vermont formerly owned by Louisine Havemeyer |
"It would seem natural that during their leisurely weeks together Mary Cassatt might undertake a portrait of Louisine; possibly she did so, but was dissatisfied with her efforts, just as she had been with her finished pastel of her friend executed in 1896. About this portrait Cassatt had subsequently written to Louisine: 'You will make a splendid old woman, but I won't be there to paint you. I might have succeeded there, though I did not come near your maturity.' Indeed, in Cassatt's portrait of Louisine at the age of forty-one the sitter seems swallowed up by her voluminous dress, by far the picture's most dominant feature, whereas her face plays a decidedly secondary role."
– quoted passages from The Havemeyers: Impressionism Comes to America by Frances Weitzenhoffer (New York: Abrams, 1986)