The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Little Nude was started about 1878, but reworked and signed some time between 1888 and 1890.

Little Nude, Freer Gallery of Art

It is fully catalogued in MacDonald 1995 (cat. rais.) [more] (cat. no. 1086).

Images

Subject

Sitter

Not identified.

Technique

Technique

Little Nude, Freer Gallery of Art

Thomas Robert Way (1861-1913) described Whistler reworking this pastel:

'My father used to have hanging in his office, a pastel of a little nude figure ... One day Whistler had it out of its frame, and borrowing my pocket-box of pastels he spent nearly the whole of a day in retouching it, and raised the key of its tone amazingly, adding the red background it now has.' ¹

History

Provenance

• ca 1878: acquired by Thomas Way (1837-1915), London;
• 1905: bought from his son, Thomas Robert Way (1861-1913), by Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919), June 1905;
• 1919: bequeathed to the Freer Gallery of Art.

Further details are given in MacDonald 1995 (cat. rais.) [more] (cat. no. 1086).

Exhibitions

• 1905: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of the late James McNeill Whistler, First President of The International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers, New Gallery, Regent Street, London, 1905 (cat. no. 70) as 'Little Nude'.

By the terms of Freer's bequest, this work cannot be lent to another venue.

Bibliography

Catalogues Raisonnés

• MacDonald, Margaret F., James McNeill Whistler. Drawings, Pastels and Watercolours. A Catalogue Raisonné, New Haven and London, 1995 (cat. no. 1086) as 'Little Nude'.

Catalogues 1855-1905

• Memorial Exhibition of the Works of the late James McNeill Whistler, First President of The International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers, New Gallery, Regent Street, London, 1905 (cat. no. 70) as 'Little Nude'.

Books on Whistler

• Duret, Théodore, Histoire de J. McN. Whistler et de son oeuvre, Paris, 1904, lithographic copy by T. R. Way repr. f.p. 138.
• Way, Thomas Robert, Memories of James McNeill Whistler, the Artist, London and New York, 1912, pp. 55-56.

Catalogues 1906-Present

• Curry, David Park, James McNeill Whistler at the Freer Gallery of Art, New York and London, 1984, p. 269, pl. 265.

Websites

• Freer Gallery of Art website at https://asia.si.edu/object/F1905.127a-c.