Mary Cassatt (1844-1926) was born near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and studied art at the Pennsylvania Academy from 1860-62. As early as 1865, she convinced her parents to let her study in Paris, where in 1868 she showed her first painting at the Paris Salon. Returning briefly to the states in 1870 because of the Franco-Prussian War, Cassatt went back to Europe the following year, eventually settling in Paris in 1877, even convincing her parents and sister to join her there. Soon after, Cassatt was invited by Edgar Degas to join a group of independent artists who would become known as the Impressionists, thus becoming the only American officially associated with the group. She exhibited in four of their now famous eight Impressionist exhibitions, in 1879, 1880, 1881, and 1886, and became a close protegé of Degas, developing her printmaking techniques under his important influence.