Jar

Hoisting her skirt as she crosses the stage, the performer embodies the allure of modern life that captivated artists at the beginning of the twentieth century. An amateur thespian and avid theatergoer, Everett Shinn regularly depicted venues such as Keith’s vaudeville theater, in which he emphasized the dramatic spectacle of the stage. Much like his contemporaries, including the French Impressionist Edgar Degas, Shinn imagined this scene from the angled vantage point of the audience—whose members he included in many of his canvases—testifying to his understanding of the theater as a social space.