The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Nocturne in Grey and Gold: Chelsea Fish Shop may have dated from 1885, and certainly before its first exhibition in 1886. ¹

Alan Summerly Cole (1846-1934) noted in his diary on 26 November 1885 that Whistler was 'Doing new work by painting at night for night effects', which may have included this painting. ²

Most of Whistler's Nocturnes date from the 1870s, including Chelsea subjects such as Nocturne: Grey and Gold - Chelsea Snow y174 and Nocturne: Trafalgar Square - Snow y173. Although Whistler painted a few Nocturnes in the 1880s, including Nocturne in Blue and Silver: The Lagoon,Venice y212 and Nocturne: Blue and Gold - St Mark's, Venice y213 in Italy; and three in London (Nocturne: Chelsea y235, Nocturne: Silver and Opal - Chelsea y309, and Orange Woman y310), no others are known to have been painted as late as 1885.

Images

Subject

Titles

Only one title has been suggested:

• 'Nocturne in grey and gold – Chelsea Fish Shop' (1886, Dowdeswell). ³
• 'Nocturne in Grey and Gold: Chelsea Fish Shop' (1980, YMSM). ⁴

'Nocturne in Grey and Gold: Chelsea Fish Shop' is the preferred form of the title.

Description

The Saturday Review on 22 May 1886 described it as 'a supposed rendering of lights on a foggy night.' The description in the Magazine of Art suggests the colour was basically brown but does not otherwise help to identify it: 'The dark brown fog ... though it ... represents nothing, sounds as it were, the fundamental bass of the chord in a low octave.' ⁵

Site

Chelsea, London, UK.

Street in Old Chelsea, Boston Museum of Fine Arts

Maunder's Fish shop in Chelsea – which could have been the subject – appears in several of Whistler's prints and paintings including Street in Old Chelsea y249.

Technique

Technique

The art critic of the Saturday Review on 22 May 1886 criticized 'the sketchiness of manner which is used with such judgement and true effect in other instances.' ⁶

Conservation History

Unknown.

Frame

Unknown.

History

Provenance

Unknown.

Exhibitions

• 1886: 'Notes' - 'Harmonies' - 'Nocturnes', Second Series, Messrs Dowdeswell, London, 1886 (cat. no. 65) as 'Nocturne in grey and gold – Chelsea Fish Shop'.

The price was estimated by Dowdeswell at £50 but this was doubled by Whistler to £100, so he obviously thought highly of it. ⁷ It was described in the Saturday Review on 22 May 1886 as 'a supposed rendering of lights on a foggy night, [which] unfortunately prejudices people against the sketchiness of manner which is used with such judgement and true effect in other instances.' ⁸ It received a marginally more appreciative comment in the Dundee Evening Telegraph on 27 May 1886:

'Mr Whistler has been undervalued a little too much. He can draw and he can paint when he likes; and in that case he may surely describe a girl with crimson cap as" a note in flesh-colour and red", or Chelsea fish-shop as "a nocturne in grey and gold", if it pleases him to do so.'

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. 336) as 'Nocturne in Grey and Gold: Chelsea Fish Shop'.

Authored by Whistler

• None.

Catalogues 1855-1905

• 'Notes' - 'Harmonies' - 'Nocturnes', Second Series, Messrs Dowdeswell, London, 1886 (cat. no. 65) as 'Nocturne in grey and gold – Chelsea Fish Shop'.

Newspapers 1855-1905

• Anon., ['A Lady Correspondent'], 'English Art in Bond Street', Dundee Evening Telegraph, Dundee, 27 May 1886, p. 4.

Journals 1855-1905

• Saturday Review, London, 22 May 1886.
• Anon., 'Chronicle of Art: Art in May', The Magazine of Art, vol. 9 (supplement), 1886, pp. xxx-xxxi, at p. xxxi.

Monographs

• None.

Books on Whistler

• None.

Books, General

• None.

Catalogues 1906-Present

• None.

Journals 1906-Present

• None.

Websites

• None.

Unpublished

• Revillon, Joseph Whistler, Draft Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of J. McN. Whistler, [ca 1945-1955], Glasgow University Library (cat. no. 364).

Other

• None.