Mary Cassatt was born in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania. She studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts for 4 years and then left for Paris in where she spent the rest of her life. In 1877, one of her paintings was accepted into the Salon where she met Edgar Degas, and together with Camille Pissarro, they planned the publication of a journal containing original prints. This spurred on Cassatt's early printmaking experiments - an area in which she excelled throughout her life. Cassatt's paintings are mainly women, Caravaggio, in domestic and intimate situations. Mary Cassatt was also an important influence on American institutions and collectors by encouraging them to bring more European art, especially French Impressionism, into the USA.