Painter Mary Cassatt created a masterpiece for the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. Then, it disappeared.
The Art Institute of Chicago’s fall blockbuster shows the work of impressionist painter Mary Cassatt. And at the exhibit’s heart is an art mystery.
The show tells the story of the giant, three-panel mural that Cassatt created for the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. However, the piece itself is missing. After the fair ended, it went into storage and was never seen again.
“The last known location is 1912 here in Chicago, and then the paper trail ends,” said curator Annelise Madsen. “One of the objectives of the exhibition is to piece together that story and try to bring it back to life for visitors. It’s such an important part of Chicago history.”
Cassatt, who was an American painter living in Paris, was commissioned to create the mural, “Modern Woman,” for the fair’s Woman’s Building, which was spearheaded by the wealthy Chicago philanthropist Bertha Palmer.
According to art historian Wanda Corn, a professor emeritus at Stanford University, the building was a major standout at the fair.
“There were exhibitions about women's patents, women's innovations, women's books, women as fisher women, every single thing that women were contributing to American culture at the time,” Corn said.
Cassatt’s mural hung in the building’s main hall and was mirrored by another commissioned mural by artist Mary MacMonnies, entitled “Primitive Woman.”
Mary Cassatt’s “Modern Woman” mural in progress, c. January 1893. The mural, unveiled during the 1893 World’s Fair, was last seen in 1912.
From Maud Howe Elliott, ed., Art and Handicraft in the Woman’s Building of the World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago, 1893 (Goupil, 1893), 25. Courtesy of the Art Institute
The murals were an enormous physical undertaking and represented a rare opportunity for women artists of the day. Cassatt’s work stretched 60 feet long and 14 feet high. Three scenes show well-dressed women chasing after a metaphor for fame, playing music and tending to an orchard. That scene in the middle signifies women plucking the fruits of knowledge and science.
Together, Cassatt’s massive work showed, “the possibilities today of women becoming educated, becoming artists, and actually seeking fame, just as she, Mary Cassatt, herself had sought,” said Corn.
After the fair, the Woman’s Building, like most others, was destroyed. Cassatt’s mural and other artwork were put in storage. Madsen said the last known location was in the Palmer family’s Gold Coast mansion, which was located on Lake Shore Drive and was once the largest private residence in the city before it was demolished in 1950.
Around 1912, the then-director of the Art Institute wrote a letter to inquire about unrolling the mural to see if it could be installed temporarily at the museum.
“That paper trail is in the Art Institute's archives, and it ends with the director wondering about whether it could come out again, and it just didn't happen,” Madsen said.
There’s speculation the piece was damaged by water or perhaps burned in a fire. But could Cassatt’s mural still be out there? Corn says: Not likely.
“So many women have looked for it. And they seem to have done an awful lot of work to pretty much determine that it is gone,” Corn said. “So I don't think there's a chance that it would show.”
Still, the mural did help to solidify Cassatt’s reputation in the States. And, it paved the way for women artists
“If you're going to look for women doing large paintings, you're probably going to start your story in 1893,” Corn said. “And then follow it thereafter as other women stepped up and took on more larger paintings and larger commissions.”
Courtney Kueppers is an arts and culture reporter at WBEZ.
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