Stettheimer Spring Sale at Bendel's Magnet

$6.00 at Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Florine Stettheimer set this scene like a stage, framed by a grand red staircase at left and a long red drape mimicking a theater curtain at right. The depicted customers of Bendel’s, the famous Manhattan department sore, lack the decorum and manners expected of women in this period. Instead, they frantically dive for clearance items, change clothes, inspect garments, and examine their mirrored reflections. Stettheimer lets us see "behind the curtain" to observe these women during a moment of unabashed…