The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Chelsea Rags dates from about 1899.

Chelsea Rags, Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University.

It is catalogued in MacDonald 1995 (cat. rais.) [more] (cat. no. 1586).

Images

Subject

Site

Chelsea Rags, Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University.

Chelsea Rags, lithograph, Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

Chelsea, London. The shop appears in the lithograph Chelsea Rags c026 and, in reverse, in Rag Shop, Milman's Row, Chelsea [329] and .

Technique

Composition

This is the same subject as Rag Shop, Milman's Row, Chelsea [329] and Chelsea Rags c026 but is not a study for them.

Technique

Chelsea Rags, Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University.

The technique is atypical of Whistler, with short, scratchy, rather uncertain lines and cross-hatching.

History

Provenance

• 1903: said to have been in Whistler's studio at his death and bequeathed to Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958);
• 1950s: said to have been sold by Miss Philip to Colnaghi's, London dealers.
• Date unknown: owned by Raymond E. Lewis (d. 2005), art dealer, San Francisco.
• 1975: gift of the Committee for Art to Stanford University Museum of Art.

Exhibitions

It was not exhibited in Whistler's lifetime.

Bibliography

Catalogues Raisonnés

• MacDonald, Margaret F., James McNeill Whistler. Drawings, Pastels and Watercolours. A Catalogue Raisonné, New Haven and London, 1995 (cat. no. 1586) as 'Chelsea Rags'.

Catalogues 1906-Present

• Eitner, Lorenz (intro.) and Betsy G. Fryberger, Whistler: Themes and Variations, Stanford University Museum of Art, Stanford, 1978 (cat. no. 47).
• Tedeschi, Martha, and Britt Salvesen, Songs on Stone: James McNeill Whistler and the Art of Lithography, Chicago, 1998 repr. p. 46.

Websites

• Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University at http://cantorcollections.stanford.edu.