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#cuadrodeldía Las hermanas, 1899 (Frank Weston Benson 1862–1951) #TerraFoundation for American Art Chicago #art Famoso por retratos realistas (familias distinguidas y frescos para la Biblioteca del Congreso) y obras impresionistas, muchas con sus hijas de modelos #FelizDomingo

Lilla Cabot Perry’s second daughter, Edith, modeled for “The Green Hat,” in which she is shown sitting facing left, with her face turned partly toward the viewer and her eyes gazing dreamily downward. Edith is enveloped in a black fur-trimmed cloak over her white blouse with ruffled cuffs. Her delicate head is overbalanced by an enormous black hat with a large fan-like green and gold decoration that lends color to this otherwise almost monochromatic image. The eyes, with their indirect gaze, are overshadowed by the hat just as the sitter’s personality seems subsumed in her social identity as a woman — or object — of fashion. Perry excelled at figure painting, and especially portraiture. The three Perry daughters posed repeatedly for their mother. Paintings such as “The Green Hat” with titles that emphasize a valued object held, regarded, or worn by the solitary female figure, highlighted a painter’s ability to create a pleasing figural composition that allowed viewers to see the figure as a generalized representation of women rather than as an identified, actual sitter. Perry was especially adept at the solid representation of the figure in space, underscored here in the play of light on Edith’s face. This traditional technique is juxtaposed with a more expressive use of vivid brushwork for its own sake: the background is patterned by a series of active gray and orange strokes that emphasize the flat surface of the canvas as much as they suggest the wall and floor beyond the figure. The painting’s agitated background may have a connection to Edith. Born in 1880, the middle of Perry’s three daughters, she suffered from mental illness. In “The Green Hat,” her air of melancholic reverie may reflect the painter’s intimate awareness of her unsettled inner world. Although repeatedly exhibited by the artist, the painting became a gift to her eldest daughter, Margaret, two years after Edith was confined to a private psychiatric hospital.

The Green Hat by Lilla Cabot Perry (American) - Oil on canvas / 1913 - Terra Foundation for American Art (Chicago, Illinois) #womeninart #art #portrait #oilpainting #LillaCabotPerry #artwork #womensart #portraitofawoman #womanartist #femaleartist #TerraFoundation #TerraFoundationforAmericanArt #hat

“The Beach at St. Malo, France.” Gabriel Spat (American; 1890–1967). Oil on canvas, undated. Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois.

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