''Preparing for the Matinee'' is an

oil painting Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments with a medium of drying oil as the binder. It has been the most common technique for artistic painting on wood panel or canvas for several centuries, spreading from Europe to the rest of ...

by American artist

Edmund C. Tarbell Edmund Charles Tarbell (April 26, 1862August 1, 1938) was an American Impressionist painter. A member of the Ten American Painters, his work hangs in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Metropolitan Museum of Art, National Gallery of Art, Smithson ...

, created in 1907. It is currently part of the permanent collection at the

Indianapolis Museum of Art The Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA) is an encyclopedic art museum located at Newfields, a campus that also houses Lilly House, The Virginia B. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park: 100 Acres, the Gardens at Newfields, the Beer Garden, and more. It i ...

Description

A young woman, identified as Charlotte Barton of Boston, sits in a green patterned chair, adjusting her pearl-tipped

hatpin A hatpin is a decorative and functional pin for holding a hat to the head, usually by the hair. In Western culture, hatpins are almost solely used by women and are often worn in a pair. They are typically around in length, with the pinhead bei ...

in a gilded mirror. A corner of

Vermeer Johannes Vermeer ( , , see below; also known as Jan Vermeer; October 1632 – 15 December 1675) was a Dutch Baroque Period painter who specialized in domestic interior scenes of middle-class life. During his lifetime, he was a moderately succe ...

’s ''

The Music Lesson ''The Music Lesson'', ''Woman Seated at a Virginal'' or ''A Lady at the Virginals with a Gentleman'' by Johannes Vermeer is a painting of a young female pupil receiving a music lesson from a man. The man's mouth is slightly agape giving the impr ...

'' can be seen in the upper right corner. She is dressed very elegantly, and, as suggested by the title, is going out to the matinee. The loose brushstrokes of her shirt, hair, and hat are elegantly contrasted with the solidness of the chair she is sitting in.

Historical information

Born, raised, and educated in and around the Boston, Massachusetts area, Tarbell was interested in the lives of the women who lived in the area. Tarbell was the leader of the Boston School, a group of artists who painted women in interior and exterior settings, usually active in mundane, domestic activities. Using

impressionist Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

techniques, they bring to life these seemingly dull activities with their lively brushstrokes. Tarbell concentrated on the world of upper-class women, depicting them elegantly in the latest fashions. These women exemplified the

Boston Brahmin The Boston Brahmins or Boston elite are members of Boston's traditional upper class. They are often associated with Harvard University; Anglicanism; and traditional Anglo-American customs and clothing. Descendants of the earliest English colonis ...

lifestyle.

Acquisition

The painting was originally purchased by

Washington University in St. Louis Washington University in St. Louis (WashU or WUSTL) is a private research university with its main campus in St. Louis County, and Clayton, Missouri. Founded in 1853, the university is named after George Washington. Washington University is r ...

in 1909, and loaned to the City Art Museum. It was sold by the Kende Galleries in New York in 1945 to the J.W. Young Art Gallery at Chicago. John G. Rauch of Indianapolis purchased the painting from the gallery, and his wife subsequently donated it to the Indianapolis Museum of Art in 1982.

Artist

References

{{IMAart Paintings in the Indianapolis Museum of Art 1907 paintings American paintings Paintings of women