American printmaker and painter Mary Cassatt was born in 1844 in Pennsylvania, but most of her career took place in France, having spent time both in France and Germany with her family when she was young. She was renowned for being the only American artist to have exhibited in Paris with the Impressionists. Her family did not approve of her desire to be an artist, but regardless, at 15, she decided to attend the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia to formally study painting. Her subject matter often featured the lives of women, and frequently the bond between a child and its mother.
