Spanish Dancer Wearing a Lace Mantilla

Spanish Dancer Wearing a Lace Mantilla (1873, Smithsonian American Art Museum) was painted during Cassatt's early years in Europe, when she made an extended visit to Spain to study Velázquez, Murillo, and the Spanish masters. The subject of a Spanish woman in traditional dress reflects the Orientalist and exotic-subject enthusiasm that still influenced academic painting of the era. The work predates Cassatt's full embrace of Impressionism, showing a painter in transition — technically skilled from her studies, drawn to vivid subjects, but not yet committed to the radical modernism she would adopt within a few years.

The painting uses stronger tonal contrasts and more detailed costume rendering than Cassatt's mature Impressionist work. The lace mantilla is rendered with careful attention to pattern and transparency. The palette is warm and Spanish-influenced, darker and more conventionally modeled than her work after 1877.