The Barefooted Child

Seated on a throne-like armchair, a woman gazes devotedly at the contented child on her lap in Mary Cassatt's aquatint print The Barefooted Child. Centrally posed and viewed head-on, the figures convey visually the stability of nurturing motherhood. As she encircles the baby with her arms, the mother seems to present the golden-haired infant in a modern, secular version of the Madonna and Child paintings of Italian Renaissance masters who inspired Cassatt. Notwithstanding the woman's contemporary attire, with its fashionable puffy sleeves, the reference to the New Testament Mary with the infant Christ is underscored in the traditional blue and white colors of the figures' respective clothing. In contrast to the more fully defined settings of Cassatt's typical images of mothers and children, such as the bedroom interior of Maternal Caress (TF 1994.5) and the outdoor scene featured in By the Pond (TF 1999.25), this image offers only an undefined background of an atmospheric green, Here, the absence of a specific setting helps convey the universal nature of the subject.

This print is among the last color aquatints Cassatt made in a six- or seven-year period of intense involvement in the medium. The Barefooted Child reiterates Cassatt's favorite mother-and-child theme-seen also, for example, in Jenny and Her Sleepy Child (TF 1988.24)-with particular directness and immediacy. 

Impressions de toujours: les peintres américains en France, 1865–1915 (Lasting Impressions: American Painters in France, 1865–1915), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–October 31, 1993; April 1–October 30, 1994; April 1–October 31, 1995. [exh. cat.]

Regard sur Mary Cassatt (Mary Cassatt at a Glance), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 2–October 31, 1996.

 Mary Cassatt, graveur impressionniste (Mary Cassatt: Impressionist Printmaker), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–July 3, 2005. [exh. cat.]Terra Collection-in-Residence, Ashmolean Museum of Art & Archaeology, Oxford, United Kingdom, September 15, 2022–September 30, 2026.

 

Breeskin, Adelyn Dohme. The Graphic Work of Mary Cassatt: A Catalogue Raisonné. 2nd ed. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1979. No. 160, p 66; ill. p. 152 (black & white).

Mathews, Nancy Mowll and Barbara Stern Shapiro. Mary Cassatt: The Color Prints. (exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts). Boston, Massachusetts: Museum of Fine Arts, 1989. No. 22 (fifth state), pp. 189–91.

Adelson, Warren et al. Mary Cassatt: Prints and Drawings from the Artist's Studio. (exh. cat., Adelson Galleries, Inc.). Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2000. Text p. 106; ill. pp. 106 (black & white), p. 107 (color).

Mary Cassatt: Impressions. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2005; Paris: Le Passage Paris–New York Éditions, 2005. Text p. 57 (checklist); ill. p. 74 (color).