Spring: Margot Standing in a Garden (Fillette dans un jardin)

Spring: Margot Standing in a Garden (1900, Metropolitan Museum of Art) was painted at the height of Cassatt's mature career, following the influential series of color aquatint prints she produced in 1890–91. The subject — a small girl in a spring garden — allowed her to explore the interplay of figure and botanical setting that had become central to her vision. By 1900 Cassatt had adopted a looser, more decorative style informed equally by Japanese aesthetics and the Post-Impressionist simplifications emerging around her in Paris.

The figure is set against an open, lightly worked garden background with fresh greens and creamy whites. Cassatt's brushwork is broad and summary, relying on color temperature contrast — warm pinks in the child's dress against cool garden greens — rather than precise rendering. The composition is flat and direct.