The Thames

James Abbot McNeill Whistler (1834–1903)

1896

Lithotint, printed in black ink on laid paper, trimmed at the edge of the image, leaving a signature tab

10 1/2 x 7 1/2 inches (26.5 x 19.1 cm)

This is one of only 12 impressions in the third (final) recorded by T. R. Way

Provenance: Charles C Cunningham Jr, stamp verso

Source: Whistler on the Thames.

See commentary below

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Commentary by Gordon Cooke

In 1900 Whistler won a medal for The Thames at the Exposition Universelle in Paris, where it was also seen by the critic Théodore Duret who wrote in a letter to the artist: ‘I was not familiar with the View of the Thames, that sort of demi-nocturne crafted with a wholly new quality. It is infused with transparency and incredible lightness, and I was astonished by it.’

For The Thames Whistler returned to lithotint, a medium he had not used since 1878. It was his final work using this technique, the last of the river and the last of a series done at the Savoy Hotel where he and his wife Beatrix stayed in February and March 1896 in rooms which had spectacular river views.

There were about six impressions in the first state and about ten in the second; in the third state the streaks present in the earlier states were successfully removed. The stone went back and forth between the Savoy and Thomas Way’s offices, as the artist insisted on having ‘nature to refer to’ when making his corrections. In an article published in The Print Collector’s Quarterly in 1913, T. R. Way recalled that ‘He knew what he wanted to get, and nothing short of it would satisfy him, even if the work had to be done over and over again; no trouble was too great for him to take.’

Way believed The Thames to be one of Whistler’s greatest achievements, but although he begged him to allow more than the twelve impressions in the final state to be printed, he was refused. However Rosalind Birnie Philip, Whistler’s executrix ordered Frederick Goulding to reprint a total of 121 impressions from the stone in three printings in 1903 and 1904.

Bibliography

Stratis, Harriet K., and Martha Tedeschi, Eds. The Lithographs of James McNeill Whistler. Chicago, 1998, pp. 454-59, no.161.

Whistler on the Thames. London: The Fine Art Society, 2013. No. 14, pp. 42-43.

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Last modified 22 May 2014