Sunday, February 28, 2016

Change in the Sitting Room

Hi Dear Folk,

It is done, it took all day Saturday but it has been accomplished, the re arranging of our sitting room.  We have a very large old comfortable sofa which was given to us by friends before they moved back to Scotland and it was given to them by someone on the Main Line.  I think originally it was a good sofa, because it still is and it is years old.  Having said that it is large and deep.  My room is longer and narrower and it always seems to be grouped around the center of the room and either end is no mans land.  My plan was to move the sofa to the end of the room and sit it across the short wall, making the room look wider and I think that has been accomplished and I am very happy with the way it turned out.  It took all day, but the entire room got a badly needed spring clean too.


So here is the sofa at the end of the room, I have had it at the other end of the room, but it is definitely better at this end.


This chair stayed in the same place, but has basically lived either to the left or to the right of the fireplace.


This corner stayed the same, except for a total re arrangement of knickknacks, I will never be a minimalist I have too many collections.   The table is Eastlake style along with the mirror and some of the shelves, I bought all these in a little antique shop that used to be in town, unfortunately no longer there.  Also the little art deco lamp sitting on the desk below also came from there along with a J W Gozzard print of  Monterey.


The secretary desk had to be moved from one corner of the room to the opposite end of the room.


The barristers bookcase had to be moved out of the other corner and relocated here, with the very small Eastlake sofa beside it, this wall was where the big sofa used to sit.  The Eastlake corner shelf, an Ebay find, had to be relocated to this corner from the opposite corner and a number of pictures had to be taken down.  Some books, pictures and photographs will be retired to the attic, oh and did I say I retired a chest and the TV to the basement last weekend to give me more room.  I hardly ever watch TV so no big loss and there's always The Boys monster upstairs.


So not to prove a total bore over this basically that's it.  I cannot say how happy I am with this arrangement for several reasons.  Sitting on the relocated sofa gives one a totally different view of the room, a lovely place to sit and read by the window, where the sunlight pours in in the afternoon, and a better view of the fire, because the sofa is low and with the Chinese table between that and the fire ones view of the fire was impeded.


As everything had to come off all the shelves a total re putting together of collections was done, it was like collecting and enjoying them all over again. These used to sit inside the bookcase and now sit on top.  I used to collect one or two of these every time I went to England, I love the boot houses, very whimsical.



This my American collection of houses and barns used to sit on top of the barrister bookcase and now they sit happily on the window sill, we have very deep sills.  I love the shadows in these pictures.



My collection of clocks that used to sit in the opposite window sill now sit on the fireplace mantle.


And this is the other end of the room now.  I intend to buy a lovely big bunch of daffodils and put them in that vase.

Hope you didn't mind me prattling on, but I am super happy with the outcome and even Mr. B. approves.

Christy

Friday, February 26, 2016

Yippee it's the Weekend

Hi Dear Folk,

Yippee it's the weekend.  Crazy busy week at work but that seems to be the norm now.

And those of you who have children at College does this scenario sound familiar to you.  Our Boy phones at 10:30 PM at night, "Mum can you find the photos I took in Florida on that rainy evening with the raindrops on the window in the VW Bus and the one of my hat on the seat and the steering wheel?"

Now said Mum has already worked a crazy busy day, has sorted out said Boy's expenses with the bank, exchanged thoughts on duplication of a broken pair of glasses frames, that he got replaced, but somehow landed up with two sets of frames, two charges and one set had to be returned.  Now at 10:30 PM I am to look for photos for a portfolio he is submitting for a job app and must be done that night.

Photos are on the backup hard drive I did for you mum.  Mum at this point cannot remember where back up hard drive has been put.  After a house search for this, said back up drive is found and plugged in to search for photos.  All other Florida photos are on hard drive but is missing our very first day, when these were taken.  Obviously said Boy never backed them up.

Must be on very old laptop which has now been relegated to a shelf in the basement.  Fortunately said laptop was still charged and Voila!  said photos have been located and emailed to said Boy.

By this time said mother is beyond frazzled, because said mother does not do well at night when very tired.

So Yippee it's the weekend.

I have mentally been preparing Mr. B. for two weeks to help me rearrange the sitting room.  It has to be done that way to let the thought of change and doing it sink in.

Well take care, have a great weekend.

Christy


Thursday, February 25, 2016

Warm and Natural Needled Cotton Batting

Hi Dear Folk,

I ran across this at Jo-Ann fabric store, and I just love using it.  Natural needled cotton batting, made from American grown cotton and made in the USA, which is a few and far between phenomena.




You might ask, how am I getting on with my Hawaii quilt square, well it is slow, I don't think I am a natural born quilter.  Mr. B. said the white looked funny, and I think the piecing together of uniform shapes is too constraining for me.  So this my be my last States Quilt Square.

I had even bought the material below for my interpretation of the Alaskan State Quilt Square, but as my time is limited I think I can better spend it on other created quests.  I thought if I carry on with this I will have popped my clogs before it is finished.

So may make the above into a cushion.


Can always use this on something.  It reminded me of our old popup camper and camping in Alaska, along with the Sitka spruce trees and camp fires in the evening swirling up between the tree branches into the night sky. Also the Indian arrows in the fabric, and the Native Americans of Alaska; which again leads me to words and terminology.  In Canada they refer to Indians as First Nations or First Peoples of Canada, which I think might be a better terminology.


I have however started on a Crazy Quilt, it is much more free form and allows for all kind of fabrics, arrangements and embroidery stitches, rummaging and using what you have and incorporating new ideas as you come upon them, that's more my style.

It takes me back to my remembrances of my grandmother who I have said previously worked at Courtaulds; well she always had an ongoing crazy quilt piece of material to add pieces of fabric to as she would get odd ends of brocade and silks from the mill and of course the edges were always embroidered in feather stitch.

Christy

Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Milliner or Haterer

Hi Dear Folk,

It popped into my head the other day, why is a maker of hats called a milliner and not a haterer, what does the word milliner have to do with hat, where did it come from?

Milliner or Millinery - a vendor of fancy wares and articles of apparel, especially of such as were originally of Milan manufacturers.  First definition 1530's "Milan bonnets," ribbons and gloves.

Bonnet from Frankish "bunne" (that which is bound), Latin "abbonis (ribbon of a headdress) also Frankish "obbuni" (above, over)

Hat, olde English "haett, German origin related to Norse "holtr" (hood)

Such are the wanderings of my mind.  I find word origins to be very interesting, they round out the depth of meaning of a word.

For instance to be "blunt" with someone, old derivation from Norse, means to "shut ones eyes" in other words you shut ones eyes to their feelings.

I could go on and on but I'm always looking up the derivation of a word and it is so simple now with all our electronic devices.

Christy

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Hot Wheels Quilt Kasse Fassett

Hot Wheels - 2014
Designed by Kaffe Fassett constructed and quilted by Pauline Smith
On loan from The Quilter Guild of the British Isles/Kaffe Fassett Studio

Looking at this quilt, it seems the vibrant colours chosen to recreate the circular design of the wheels patchwork create an impression of summer parasols - like the sunbathers arranged in regiments rows, viewed from above.  The daisy print frame feels like a surrounding field of flowers or meadow, providing a calming element to such a bold and colourful piece.


Through out the gallery you saw Kasse Fassetts designed quilt, alongside the original much older quilt that inspired him.



Christy

Monday, February 15, 2016

The Expendable Man by Dorothy B. Hughes

The Expendable Man by Dorothy B. Hughes is one of the books on the Persephone list, as you may or may not know I am gradually working through all the books they have published and did actually get to visit their shop on Conduit Street in London.  If you just click on my Persephone label you will pull up all related posts.



Again a First Edition published in 1963 from my local library, Dorothy Hughes was an American writer and you would call the style of this book Noir Fiction, with a very American setting and style of writing.  It is a refreshing change to the Persephone Collection.  I also love the dust cover of this book in orange and purple with white and black so very sixties.  It says a Random House novel of suspense.



When you read a book you form pictures of the story in your mind, the characters, what they look like and sometimes it is very bad news to watch a film before you read the book.  That would certainly be very true of this book, because for the first sixty odd pages you have one image in mind and then you read a line and your whole image of this person goes through a 360 degree turn and this is so with this book.  So if you want to read this book and don't want to ruin the surprise, stop right here.

Hugh Densmore a UCLA intern, is traveling from California to Phoenix, Arizona in his mother's white Cadillac, to attend a family wedding, his niece is getting married.  He sees a young teenager at the side of the highway in the twilight of the evening and in all good conscience cannot leave her there, this he does against all his better judgement.  He knows his parents have told him never pick up a hitchhiker it will get you into trouble and other such phrases run though his mind and you begin to think it is beginning to touch on paranoia

"The shadow, raised up from its haunches, waited for his car to approach.  He knew better than to pick up a hitchhiker on the road;  he'd known it long before the newspapers and script writers had implanted the danger in the public mind.  Most assuredly he would not pick up anyone in this strange deserted land."

Bonnie Lee Crumb

"She was a teen-ager, she might have been one of the girls he'd seen at the drive-in.  She wasn't pretty;  her face was just a young, thin, petulant face, too much lipstick on the mouth, wisps of her self-bleached hair jutting from beneath the gaudy orange and green scarf covering her head.... She also carried a box handbag of white plastic."

Such a nineteen sixties picture is now set.

"I go ape over Johnny Mathis."

"Personally I prefer Sinatra."  He wondered if that dated him, as his mother was dated with Bing Crosby.

At last the music kept her quiet and he could enjoy the morning ride.  He'd always had a quickening of the heart when he crossed into Arizona and beheld the cactus country.

Hugh had dropped her off before the California/Arizona border and bought her a bus ticket, to Phoenix, it is illegal to transport a minor across a State Line, but there she was waiting for him on the Arizona side having cashed in her ticket, he was again put under an obligation to give her a ride.  He drops the girl off and arrives at his parents house.

"I stayed over in Blythe.  It was late when I got off."  He wouldn't tell her the story, he wouldn't worry her.  "Where's Dad?"

When you watch so many of the old American black and white movies, you know it was a tradition for the bride to get married out of her parents house and it is no different with Clytie, his niece.  I think a very nice tradition which has been lost now.

Clytie had chosen to be married in the ancestral home, to walk down the long front stairway as her mother and her mother's mother had before her.  With Grandfather to marry her.  He was retired now, but once a minister of the Lord, always a minister.

"The schedule?"  Tonight's a barbecue at Uncle Dan's.  The whole tribe of course and members of the wedding party.  Sports clothes."

Gram returned for more dishes.  "Barbecue.  Cooking outdoors like Indians."  She didn't wait for rebuttal but trotted back to her kitchen.

Bonnie as you already know, because you know the direction this is heading in, turns up dead.

"Like Ringle says, we got a tip.  Right after that report went out on the radio.  this guy says a nigger doc driving a big white Cadillac brought Bonne Lee to Phoenix."

This sentence is where you have to rearrange all your mental pictures and all the little cogs of information have to be taken out of their slotted cubbies in your mind and rearranged and slotted back into the correct cubbies of your mind.  It now makes sense why his parents say never pick up a hitchhiker, his grandfather is a minister, he is able to be a doctor, they have escaped the South and have a nice family home with a staircase to walk down for the bride.

This wasn't the deep South.  It was Arizona.

But prejudices are still high even out of the South.

Innocently involved?  No, he couldn't call it innocent.  Rather, it was mindless.  It was neither;  it was a paper chain of circumstances, cut from sympathy and too much imagination.  Imagination, yes - why else should he have thought that unless he picked up the girl she would be in danger?  Another car would have come along, a family car for which she had said she was waiting, or even another man, a white man.

He Dr. Hugh Densmore, product of his heredity and environment, sufficiently intelligent and well adjusted to his mind and body and color and ambition.

His mother is reading the newspaper.

Hugh could have asked her:  May I have a quick look at the front section?  But what answer could he give to her inevitable:  Why , is there some particular story ...?  And she wold glance at the front page in passing, would see the headlines about the dead girl.  Fear would squeeze her, the fear lying ever-dormant beneath the civilized front, beneath the normal life of a Los angeles housewife whose husband's income was in near-five figures, whose children had been born ad bred and coddled in serenity and security and status.

Somehow he knew, knew with dreadful clarity, that this man had full intent to make Hugh the killer.

Because the wedding was in the home, the guest list was small - the family and a few old friends.  But the reception which followed seemed to include the entire community.  there was no segregation with Clytie's university friends and John's Air Force crowd on hand.  

With all the different friends flying in for the wedding Hugh meets Ellen.

He offered Ellen a cigarette, took one himself, and lighted them.

A scene with a man and a woman smoking together seems dated in this time, but maybe not.

"You need a lawyer."

"No." He rejected it utterly, violently.  "What could a lawyer do?  I haven't been accused of anything. I haven't done anything."  He tried to make her see it.  "Having a lawyer would make me look guilty.  And I'm not."

She smiled wryly.  "Most lawyers prefer an innocent client."  He tried to laugh.  "the Judge's daughter"

The night was sharp with cold at this hour, the stars were broken glass patched against the dark sky.

I do like the above quote.

She had thought it out with care;  she must have been thinking of little else all day.  "A young man, not over forty, but top drawer in his profession;  liberal, but not too liberal, no Civil Liberties lawyer, they're suspect from the beginning because they show up in any case involving minorities.

Trying to check Ellen into the same motel as Hugh.

It was a lie and they all knew it was a lie, but there was no rancor among them.  This clerk couldn't cancel the system;  her genuine friendliness was her contribution toward eroding it.  Five years ago she wouldn't have had a vacant unit;  ten year ago she would have said, "We don't take Negroes,"  if any had had the courage or spunk to inquire.

Skye Houston pronounce  Howston, the lawyer.

His close-cropped hair was sun-bleached to pale lemon;  he was tanned far darker than Ellen, almost as dark as Hugh.

There was no excuse he could give for postponing food; ..."There's a bakery cafeteria a couple of blocks from here.  Not elegant but friendly and the food used to be good will that do?"

"It sounds just right."  She was a different girl since Houston.

The cold of the cafeteria enveloped them like a snowfall.

This so takes me back to when I first stepped foot in the USA in the seventies and what a shock air conditioning was.  Coming from a country where you did not need it and it did not exist.  How one always had to carry a cardigan even in the hottest of days, just for the sake of AC.

He'd have to ask Houston for help.  They'd be afraid not to answer Houston's questions.  It rankled that he could not bring the same force to bear, that he had to forgo his own social position and become a caricature to ask a simple question.  And receive no answer.

"He said lightly, "I hear we have some fine courses in foreign diplomacy.  Maybe you'll decide to transfer."

"Okay, Madam Ambassador."

She smiled at him.  "I didn't choose the field because I'm a feminist."  Thoughtfully, she continued, "We've traveled abroad quite a bit.  Because of my father's various assignments.  I believe there's a definite need for what I call dark diplomats.

This book is far more than Fiction Noir, it addresses the racial prejudices of the era and makes you think about what has changed and what has not.

Christy

Sunday, February 14, 2016

Kafffe Fassett Exhibition at the Michener Art Museum, Doylestown

Hi Dear Folk,

On Saturday I was able to visit the Kaffe Fassett born 1936, exhibition at the Michener Art Museum in Doylestown, PA.  The museum used to be the old Bucks County Jail.

The museum was named after James A. Michener who was a Doylestown resident, he wrote such books as Tales of the South Pacific on which the famous musical South Pacific was based.

I found out about the exhibit by chance through reading Vintage Traveller Blog about the Drexell University Penny Fox Costume Collection and that took me to an exhibit coming up at the Michener, for this collection, which took me to the current exhibit and I thought that would be lovely to see and right on my doorstep.  It was such a thrill to be able to attend an exhibition of his work, now I am going to look out for some of his books.

It also led me to become a Museum Member because they have several events coming up in the year which I would like to see, including the photographer who took that iconic photo of the Afghanistani girl that appeared on front of National Geographic magazine, see here for the museum and events.

http://www.michenerartmuseum.org


This is the outside of the museum.



Still life with Quilt 1980, an acrylic on canvas

Early in his career, Kaffe Fassett was inspired by the pictorial possibilities of patchwork in his paintings.  He made a number of still life's of patterned china and porcelain on top of quilts or other textiles, like Still Life with Quilt from 1980, the year he met Stephen Sheard of Rowan Yarns.  It was this Painting that inspired Liza Prior Lucy to urge Kaffe to begin designing patchwork - he was already doing it in pigment, she argued, why not in fabric?  The two have since collaborated on a number of books of patchwork designs and Lucy, an accomplished patchwork designer herself, interpreted Kaffe's Rustic Chequerboard Medallion in deep jewel tones of purple and red.




Still Life with Kimono, acrylic on canvas.



Birds in town gorging themselves with the fruit from this tree, not sure what it is.


Christy

Saturday, February 13, 2016

Portrait of Mrs. Louis C. Madeira IV by Walter Stuempfig, Jr.

Portrait of Mrs. Louis C. Medeira IV by Walter Stuempfig, Jr. 1914 - 1970

He was a local artist born in Germantown, Pennsylvania, which is just outside of Philadelphia.


By the look of the Dior gown, this painting dates to about 1948, combining Parisian chic with a Florentine style portrait.  It always amazes me how artists can capture fabric in paint, the rich folds, you feel that you could reach out and touch it.

I was so happy to be able to leave work early on Friday to pick up the TV.  I was exhausted it had been a mind bender of a week, all sorts of things to sort out.  I pulled myself together and arrived on time, said my thank you, had the photos taken.  It came into my mind as I left, that I was craving a Chai Latte from Starbucks, and it just happened that the road I took home went right past Barnes and Nobles a book shop where they have a Starbucks inside.  So I treated myself along with a cranberry shortbread and looked at a crochet magazine, while drinking my Chai, and it felt just right.

I left the TV in the SUV.  Mr. B. works in the evenings and I could not even stay awake to help him in with the TV and I was most surprised when I went down in the very early hours of the morning and saw the TV sitting in the sitting room.  Since Mr. B.  was up also making me a cup of tea, he decided for us to take the TV upstairs together and get it set up, which we did, or he did with a little help from me.  It does not seem too big, as the old TV although smaller had a much wider strip edge than this one does, so it looks good.  My Boy in Ithaca who bought the old TV said that it was nine years old, but I didn't remember it being that old.  It is not something we would have gone out and spent our money on, but is very nice for a gift.

Tuppy took a great interest in all the proceedings, even crawling into the empty box to have a good nose, cats are the funniest when anything new comes into the house or is rearranged.  She loves to sit on the radiator covers and look out the window, so I leaned over and looked out the window with her, the night light was reflecting off the frozen snow on the Simla Room roof, just beautiful sparkling away and you do not catch that in the day light.

Tonight we will watch a movie on our new TV.  Now I am looking out the window and it is a blustering, whirling snow squall, I'm not sure if it is here to stay or just passing through, it is down into the teens and twenties temperature wise.

I am reading The Shepherd's Life by James Rebanks, it was at my local library and I recognized it immediately as being the book I had listened to on BBC radio.  It is so interesting and I feel akin because my great grandfather was a shepherd on the Dorset downs, and my grandfather came from Somerset and almost always managed a farm and eventually had his own small holding.  I wish he was still around to talk with, what he knew about growing things was amazing.

The Shepherd's Life is about sheep farming in the Lake District of Northern England, the area of Beatrix Potter and Wordsworth.  His family have been there for probably over a thousand years.  The upper fells are Common Land, this goes back to ancient feudal times and is probably hard for an outsider to understand; but I do because where I lived as a child in Hertfordshire, it was in the village of Albury and in that village of Albury was an area called Patmore Heath.  We owned an old cottage on the edge of the heath.  Geologically the heath was totally different to the surrounding farm land and Common rights to graze animals on the heath went with the ownership of the older properties around the heath, but had to be registered legally and I remember my parents paying a fee through a solicitor to keep these rights with the cottage.  So the land is not owned by anyone but is for the commoner for grazing rights.

A couple of years back I went to visit the area and our old next door neighbors still live there, I spoke with their son now grown up and he said that his father had to fight tooth and nail to stop a property developer from coming in and building on the Common land, this is so wrong.  These rights go back to the Domesday Book, and how someone should finagle things to try and take something like this is beyond me.  Just the fauna and flora of the heath is so different and such a tiny pocket in the South East part of England.  This area although in the country is only forty miles from London, so a very sort after, property prices are over the top.

http://www.hertswildlifetrust.org.uk/reserves/patmore-heath

Christy


Tuesday, February 9, 2016

Susan Santje by Thomas Cowperthwaite Eakins

Portrait of Susan Santje by Thomas Cowperthwaite Eakins 1844 - 1916.  He was born in Philadelphia and was a realist painter, photographer and sculptor, he is considered one of the most important American artists in American art history.


Suzanne Santje (1873-1947) was a Philadelphia born actress who studied music in Berlin and drama in Paris.  Eakins shows her not on stage but during a private moment in her study, dressed in a vibrant gown and surrounded by objects, including a script of the romantic drama Camille, and a portrait of her father, Charles Shearer Keyser.

When I saw this painting I thought she looks like me at the end of the day, although I am not sitting resplendently in a beautiful gown.

This week has been a funny week and it's only Tuesday.  I keep having this feeling that the sky is going to fall in on me, maybe as it has started off as a crazy busy week at work looks like it will continue that way.

Yesterday I had a very big, nice surprise.  My boss leans over my desk area and says "Did you watch the Superbowl?"  which I had to admit to not watching, he said "I'm surprised because you had a vested interest."  "I did?"

It seems that I won the grand prize from a vendor open house that I attended last week.  You had to write your name in a number on the board, which I did;  I had no idea it was related to the Superbowl score.  My boss said up until a few minutes before the end of the game he was the owner of the prize. 

Yes the grand prize was a 60" Samsung 4K Smart TV.  I think this is honestly a more thrilling prize for the Boys in my life, because I quite happily sit with my Mac streaming movies and doing my crochet.  I'd probably cash it in if I could, but the Boys will have fun.  It is a generous prize and to actually be a recipient amazes me.  I will pick it up on Friday and do a little photo prize acceptance.

Christy

Saturday, February 6, 2016

Weathering Through Winter and Italian Pie Salad Recipe

Hi Dear Folk,

Weathering through winter with my beautiful alpaca and merino yarn that I bought off a farm in NY State.  I'm loving this simple crochet pattern, because when my one skein of yarn is finished then I'll just end my little neck warmer scarf.


This is hand dyed and I have named the colour, Isle of Skye  - Heather and Broom, because it has the purple of the heather and this lovely bright yellow the colour of broom, which you see out on the hills on the Isle of Skye.


I have plans to wear this with a purple velvet hat I have I think it will look nice together.  Will use a little stick pin to hold the scarf together.

This is a lovely go to pattern for one special skein of yarn.



I have three plants I am trying to winter over in the house.  My passion flower, Tahitian bridal veil and this center flower an impatiens.  I'm not too good at this and they just about stagger into spring and say thank you, thank you, thank you, when they are put out into the spring sun.

I brought home my purple primrose and hyacinth, because the way the hyacinth was growing, it was likely to bloom over the weekend and I would have missed it not being at work.  Mr. B. bought me the pink primrose, and my cyclamen is just beginning to put forth more flowers, so they make a happy little circle on my dining room table.



Look what I found at the thrift.

When Rob was only three months old we wanted to go on vacation, but where with a baby?  So in the end we found a B&B that served evening dinner as well, right up in northern Vermont, at a farm. It turned out to be just right, because if he wanted to take a nap we could just put him down and we were right there in the house.

My story though is about the large circular platter which we bought up there off a potter, it's great for huge laid out salads I have a special one I serve on here, it has all sorts of veg, deli meats and cheese and other things, and you serve it like cutting up a piece of giant pie and serve it as a wedge. Well while in the thrift recently, I found the bowl, of course I knew instantly it had to be from the same potter and here it is.  Unfortunately just one.  Still what a find over twenty years separates them and all the way from Vermont.


Here is my Italian Pie Salad recipe, given to me by Frannie from a verty Italian family here in town,  and she is no longer with us.


Italian Pie Salad


  • Romaine lettuce
  • Provolone cheese
  • Cooked salami
  • Genoa or hard salami
  • Capacola or pepperoni
  • Onions
  • Green peppers
  • Celery
  • Cucumbers
  • Sweet pickles
  • Tomatos
  • Green/Black olives


Lay a bed of lettuce and on top of that layer the meats, veg, and cheese alternating in an artistic way.

Shake with oregano, garlic powder and crazy Jane salt (which is like a seasoned salt)

This is such a delicious salad and you can change in and out what ever deli meats you have or what is on sale, but the above recipe is the traditional one.

Serve with a simple spaghetti and a bottle of wine.

Enjoy,
Christy

Monday, February 1, 2016

Woman With A Pearl Necklace in a Loge, Mary Cassatt

Woman with a Pearl Necklace, by Mary Cassatt. born in America 1844 - 1926.  She was actually born in Allegheny City, now part of Pittsburgh, PA.



In the late 1870's Mary Cassatt painted a series of theatre scenes depicting the night life of Paris.  This work showing a woman, said to be her sister Lydia, seated in front of a mirror, with the balconies of the Paris Opera House reflected behind her.

This paining was shown in Paris at the 4th Impressionist Exhibition of 1879, to much acclaim.

You may think of Mary Cassatt more for her paintings of children.

Christy


01 09 10