Both mother and child lean toward the infant Saint John the Baptist, who raises aloft a small cross, a prophecy of events to come. Bambach situated the exhibition within a historical reality that the paintings work hard to efface. Mary Cassatt, Gardner (Cassatt) Held by His Mother, 1888, drypoint print, black ink on paper, 8.3 in × 5.5″. Mary Cassatt, Children Playing on the Beach, 1884, oil on canvas, overall: 38 3/8 × 29 3/16″,framed: 46 3/8 × 37 1/8 × 2 3/4 “. “I also had the sense that art history, art institutions, and the art field weren’t to be trusted,” she has said.