I am a feminist and all of those good things. And if there is one thing I love, it’s a bad bitch.

Pardon my language, but there just isn’t another way to say what I mean and invoke the image that needs to be invoked.

So imagine my delight when, while browsing portraits in the breathtaking Philadelphia Museum of Art, I came across the baddie in this post. The piece, Arrangement in Black (The Lady in the Yellow Buskin) (c.1883), by James Abbott McNeill Whistler, spoke to me so loudly that I stopped in my tracks. Her stance, her stare, her impeccable wardrobe. She is a baddie who transcends time and space.

Lady Archibald Campbell is her name, and I couldn’t find much information on her as I hurriedly googled her name in the cab on the way back to the hotel. That’s the way it should be. Now we’re left to our imaginations to dream of how fabulous this woman was, and our only cues are descriptors from her contemporaries like “beautiful, bewitching, and eccentric.” A baddie has to have some mystery behind her. It’s always more fun when you can let your imagination go wild.

A baddie also has to ignore the naysayers. In the museum, the information placard next to the artwork stated that Lady Campbell’s family did not like the beautiful painting, claiming it brought forth imagery of a streetwalker. Lesson: Basic people always want to hold you back when you’re ahead of your time. Lady Campbell was clearly feeling herself in this photo, and that’s what makes it so beautiful. It felt like her confidence leapt off of the painting and imprinted my very spirit when I saw this. How could someone be mad at that? Someone who has made the decision to be mad in general, that’s who. Someone who is intimidated by freedom and confidence.

If Lady Campbell would have been scared into not posing for the painting, I wouldn’t have seen this portrait some 133 years later and been inspired to tap into my inner baddie. So let this be a lesson to all of us– keep your head up and keep on breaking barriers. You have no time nor right to be scared– you have work to do. How dare you try to get in the way of greatness. You are an inspiration by just boldly being yourself in a world that tells you who you should be. So put on your baddest outfit, pose like the bad bitch that you are, and give ’em a look that will make the generations after you stop in their tracks and stare.