Mary Cassatt

Like much of Cassatt’s work, this scene focuses on domestic life—here, a young woman uses a deck of cards to tell a friend’s fortune. During the 1880s, Cassatt experimented widely with soft-ground etching, a technique that allowed artists to make prints from drawings. Cassatt placed a sheet on top of a copper plate coated with a softer material, such as wax mixed with tallow. The lines she drew pressed into this material, transferring the image onto the plate. Evidence of this translation can be seen on the back of the sheet, where the material adhered.