The Letter

Mary Cassatt

Color drypoint and aquatint on laid paper

National Gallery of Art

The Letter depicts a woman seated at a writing desk, sealing an envelope by licking its flap, surrounded by a richly patterned dress and floral wallpaper rendered in cobalt blue, soft pink, and muted green. Created by the American Impressionist Mary Cassatt between 1890 and 1891, the work belongs to her celebrated series of ten color aquatints inspired by a landmark exhibition of Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints she attended at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris in spring 1890. Cassatt employed a technically demanding combination of drypoint, aquatint, and soft-ground etching from multiple plates to achieve the flat, decorative patterning and vivid color harmonies that characterize the series. The subject matter reflects her sustained focus on women's private domestic lives, a theme shaped both by her Impressionist milieu and by the social constraints that confined women largely to interior spaces.