Provenance

• 1905: bought in collaboration with 'Konody' – probably the art critic Paul George Konody (1872-1933) – by P. and D. Colnaghi & Co., London art dealers, 1 March 1905, for £50 (Colnaghi #1576);
• 1907: ownership transferred to Colnaghi's, 1 July 1907;
• 1910: sold by Colnaghi's to the Victor Fischer Co. on 7 June 1910 for £130.
• 1914: bought from V. G. Fischer by Knoedler, New York dealers, on 13 March 1914 (Knoedler #13446);
• 1914: bought from Knoedler's by Senator William Andrews Clark (1839-1925), April 1914;
• 1926: after his death, sold at auction, W. A. Clark sale, Parke-Bernet, New York, 2 January 1926 (lot 59), and bought by Kraushaar, New York art dealers, for $525;
• 1926/1929: sold by Kraushaar to Chester Dale (1883-1962);
• 1946: sold at auction, Parke-Bernet, New York, 16 May 1946 (lot 100), bought by Baruch Feldman (n/a), Renaissance Galleries, Philadelphia, for $500;
• 1947: sold by J. Levy Gallery, New York, to Babcock Galleries, New York, 31 October 1947;
• 1951: sold by Babcock Galleries on 15 October 1951 to Roger S. Phillips (dates unknown), who still owned it in 1980.
• 1990: sold at auction, Christie's, New York, 27 September 1990 (lot 26);
• 1991: donated by Albert R. Miller Jr (1913-1995), Baltimore, MD, to the Washington County Museum of Fine Arts, Hagerstown, MD;
• 1995: unveiled at Washington County Museum of Fine Arts, and dedicated to Catherine Lavinia Newcomer Miller (Mrs A. R. Miller) (m. 1945).

There is no record of this painting's history before 1905.

According to the records of the Babcock Galleries, New York, it was at one time in the possession of Richard Albert Canfield (1855-1914). However, there is no proof of this. Canfield's collection of Whistlers was sold to Knoedler’s in 1914, which is about the same time as the acquisition of La Mère Gérard (2) [YMSM 027]. This coincidence might have caused the assumption.

Exhibitions

• 1905: Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 2) as 'La mère Gérard'.

It was not exhibited in Whistler's lifetime. It was first shown in the Whistler Memorial Exhibition in Paris in 1905.