Lady with a Mask

Thomas Wilmer Dewing (1851-1938) was an American painter known for the elegant, atmospheric paintings of women in refined settings that make him one of the most distinctive painters of the American Aesthetic movement. Lady with a Mask from 1911 depicts a woman with a mask in the elegant, atmospheric manner that distinguishes Dewing's best work from the more straightforward painting of his contemporaries. The 1911 date places this in Dewing's late period, when he was still producing the elegant, atmospheric paintings of women that are his most accomplished works, and the mask subject connects the painting to the Aesthetic movement's interest in artifice and performance.

Lady with a Mask is important in the history of American painting because it demonstrates the elegant, atmospheric manner that Dewing brought to figure painting in his late period. Dewing's elegant paintings of women—combining atmospheric effect with the Aesthetic movement's interest in artifice and performance—represent one of the most distinctive traditions in American painting, and the 1911 painting shows this tradition in its late phase, still elegant and atmospheric.

Lady with a Mask is Dewing's late Aestheticism: a woman with a mask rendered in the elegant, atmospheric manner of one of the most distinctive painters of the American Aesthetic movement. The 1911 painting shows the Aesthetic interest in artifice and performance—still elegant and atmospheric in Dewing's late period.