The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea dates from the early 1880s, and was first recorded in 1884. ¹

Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea, Freer Gallery of Art

It was signed and exhibited in 'Notes' - 'Harmonies' - 'Nocturnes', Messrs Dowdeswell, London, 1884 (cat. no. 25) as 'Nocturne; Silver and Opal – Chelsea'.

Images

Subject

Titles

Several possible titles have been suggested:

• 'Nocturne; Silver and Opal – Chelsea' (1884, Dowdeswell). ²
• 'Nocturne en opale: Chelsea' (1887, Petit). ³
• 'Nocturne Opal & Silver' (1892, Whistler). ⁴
• 'Opal and Silver' (1892, Whistler). ⁵
• 'Nocturne – Opal and Silver' (1892, Goupil). ⁶
• 'Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea' (1980, YMSM). ⁷

'Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea' is the preferred title.

Description

Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea, Freer Gallery of Art

A night scene in horizontal format. It shows a broad river obscured by mist and darkness. There is a hint of lights on a tower on the far bank of the river at left; to right of this, the low span of a bridge crosses the river. At right, there is a barely discernible boat with warning lights lit.

Site

The River Thames in London, showing the old Chelsea Bridge, built in 1858 (and not replaced until 1934).

Technique

Technique

Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea, Freer Gallery of Art

It is thinly painted in distinct, fluttery brush strokes, which are criss-crossed in different directions. The result is to dissolve the shape of the bridge and obscure the view. This sort of cross-hatching is seen in some of Whistler's early Thames paintings, particularly Battersea Reach from Lindsey Houses y055, but the paint in Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea is much thinner in consistency.

Conservation History

According to Freer Gallery files, the varnish was removed with some difficulty in 1921, it was resurfaced in 1930, cleaned and surfaced in 1935, cleaned and varnished in 1937, resurfaced in 1938 (at which time the butterfly signature was partly obliterated), and cleaned and surfaced in 1951.

Frame

Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea, Freer Gallery of Art

Large Dowdeswell frame, made for Whistler's exhibition in 1884 [14.1 cm]. ⁸

History

Provenance

• 1885: bought from Messrs Dowdeswell by Henry Studdy Theobald (1847-1934);
• 1902: bought from Theobald by Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919), Detroit;
• 1919: bequeathed by C. L. Freer to the Freer Gallery of Art.

It was exhibited in Whistler's one-man show 'Notes' - 'Harmonies' - 'Nocturnes', Messrs Dowdeswell, London, 1884 and bought in the following year by H. S. Theobald, who was almost certainly the collector described by Whistler as having bought a number of paintings after the exhibition. He wrote to Walter Dowdeswell (1858-1929):

'I must know the whereabouts of every one of my little pictures -

You promised that you would give me the address of each one by referring to the catalogues -

Then again, you must arrange with the man who bought the lot that remained over after the exhibition of the "Flesh color & grey", to let his collection go with me to America.' ⁹

In June 1902, Whistler sent C. L. Freer a telegram, 'Theobald paintings at Marchants', informing him that the paintings owned by Theobald were apparently for sale. ¹⁰ Freer promptly bought the painting from Theobald in August 1902 for $1000.

Exhibitions

• 1884: 'Notes' - 'Harmonies' - 'Nocturnes', Messrs Dowdeswell, London, 1884 (cat. no. 25) as 'Nocturne; Silver and Opal – Chelsea'.
• 1887: Exposition Internationale de Peinture et de Sculpture, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 1887, 1887 (cat. no. 165) as 'Nocturne en opale: Chelsea'.
• 1892: Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces, Goupil Gallery, London, 1892 (cat. no. 11) as 'Nocturne – Opal and Silver'.
• 1904: Oil Paintings, Water Colors, Pastels and Drawings: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of Mr. J. McNeill Whistler, Copley Society, Boston, 1904 (cat. no. 68).
• 1905: Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 75).

The Liverpool Mercury described it on 3 July 1884 as: 'an evening effect of Chelsea ... which shows the painter's penchant for vague indistinctness. The study represents mist or smoke, with a dark line which may be meant for Chelsea or any other bridge.' In contrast, Walter Richard Sickert (1860-1942) wrote simply, 'Mr Whistler has never painted a finer work … There is not an artist with as true or fine a sense of the mystery and infinity of night as Mr Whistler, and this little picture, full of space and atmosphere, is impressive in its solemnity.' ¹¹

Whistler selected one of his favourite unfavourable reviews to complement this nocturne in the Goupil 1892 catalogue. It was a decade-old review of the Grosvenor Gallery exhibition of 1882, and read 'With what feelings must we regard the mad new style, the Nocturnes in "Blue and Silver," the Harmonies in Flesh-colour and Pink, the Notes in Blue and Opal.' ¹²

In 1892 the critic of The Star called it: 'perfect ... the suspension bridge seems to grow on you and then to fade away just as in the foggy twilight, when the lamps are being lit, it really does.' ¹³

By the terms of C. L. Freer's bequest to the Freer Gallery of Art, the painting cannot be lent.

Bibliography

Catalogues Raisonnés

• Young, Andrew McLaren, Margaret F. MacDonald, Robin Spencer, and Hamish Miles, The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler, New Haven and London, 1980 (cat. no. 309), plate 182, as 'Nocturne: Silver and Opal – Chelsea'.

Authored by Whistler

• None.

Catalogues 1855-1905

• 'Notes' - 'Harmonies' - 'Nocturnes', Messrs Dowdeswell, London, 1884 (cat. no. 25) as 'Nocturne; Silver and Opal – Chelsea'.
• Exposition Internationale de Peinture et de Sculpture, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 1887, 1887 (cat. no. 165) as 'Nocturne en opale: Chelsea'.
• Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces, Goupil Gallery, London, 1892 (cat. no. 11) as 'Nocturne – Opal and Silver':
• Oil Paintings, Water Colors, Pastels and Drawings: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of Mr. J. McNeill Whistler, Copley Society, Boston, 1904 (cat. no. 68);
• Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 75).

Newspapers 1855-1905

• Anon., 'Art Notes', Liverpool Mercury, Liverpool, 3 July 1884, p. 6.
• Anon., The Star, London, 19 March 1892.

Journals 1855-1905

• 'An Enthusiast', [W. R. Sickert], 'Mr Whistler and his art', The Artist and Journal of Home Culture, 1 June 1884.

Monographs

• None.

Books on Whistler

• Cary, Elizabeth Luther, The Works of James McNeill Whistler: A Study, with a Tentative List of Artist’s Works, New York, 1907, p. 167 (cat. no. 68).
• Getscher, Robert H., and Paul G. Marks, James McNeill Whistler and John Singer Sargent. Two Annotated Bibliographies, New York and London, 1986, p. 191, J. 101.
• Holden, Donald, Whistler Landscapes and Seascapes, New York, 1969, repr. pl. 31.
• Sickert, Bernhard, Whistler, London and New York, 1908, p. 170 (cat. no. 149).

Books, General

• Lawton, Thomas, Freer: a Legacy of Art, Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, 1993, p. 53.
• Robins, Anna Gruetzner (ed.), Walter Sickert: the Complete Writings on Art, Oxford, 2000, pp. 4-5.

Catalogues 1906-Present

COLLECTION:

• Stubbs, Burns A., Paintings, Pastels, Drawings, Prints and Copper Plates by and attributed to American and European Artists, together with a List of Original Whistleriana in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 1948, p. 15 (02.146).
• Curry, David Park, James McNeill Whistler at the Freer Gallery of Art, New York and London, 1984, pp. 127, 293, repr. pl. 31, upside down.

EXHIBITION:

• Myers, Kenneth John, Mr. Whistler’s Gallery: Pictures at an 1884 Exhibition, Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 2003, pp. 54-55, 89.
• Siewert, John, 'Art, music, and an aesthetics of place in Whistler's Nocturne paintings' in Lochnan, Katharine, Turner, Whistler, Monet, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, Paris; Tate Britain, London, 2004-2005, pp. 141-47, at p. 144, repr. 52 (not exhibited).

Journals 1906-Present

• None.

Websites

• Freer Gallery of Art website at https://asia.si.edu/object/F1902.146a-b.

Unpublished

• Revillon, Joseph Whistler, Draft Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of J. McN. Whistler, [ca 1945-1955], Glasgow University Library (cat no. 83) 'Nocturne, opal and silver'.

Other

• Parkerson, Sarah Lawrence, Variations in Gold: The Stylistic Development of the Picture Frames used by James McNeill Whistlers, PhD thesis, University of Glasgow, 2007.
• Siewert, John, 'Whistler’s Nocturnes and the Aesthetic Subject', PhD thesis, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 1994, p. 13.