The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

The Sea, Pourville, No. 1 probably dates from the late summer or autumn of 1899. ¹

The Sea, Pourville, No. 1, The Hyde Collection

Green and Silver: The Great Sea, The Hunterian

It is dated by comparison with other Pourville subjects, such as Green and Silver: The Great Sea y518 and The Sea, Pourville, No. 2 y519.

In the summer of 1899 Whistler took a house, the Pavillon Madeleine, at Pourville-sur-mer, near Dieppe, for his sister-in-law, Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958), and her mother. Whistler stayed there on and off (he made quick trips to London and Amsterdam in mid-August and Paris early in October) from late July until the end of October.

On 15 August Edward Guthrie Kennedy (1849-1932) of Wunderlich & Co., New York, wrote that he liked Whistler's sketches of Dieppe: 'I admired those three Dieppe sketches (you know those I mean just commenced) and when you finish them, I should like to have one or all. They are very charming.' ²

Despite poor health, Whistler wanted to get away somewhere to paint. On 29 August he wrote from the Pavillon Madeleine to Inez Eleanor Addams (1874-1958), who was visiting Ireland:

'Tell me something more of your Coast - I should like to take away with me a sea piece perhaps - and here there is nothing but the wonderful air for the health I have been too impatient to wait for.' ³

Whistler told the artist Albert Ludovici, Jr (1852-1932):

'September & October are clearly the months for the sea -

I am just beginning to understanding the principle of these things - You know how I always reduce things to principles!

Only I can't stay much longer -

I could not help thinking of your two French painters who thought they had something new in Renoir! - and who looked with contempt upon le "vieux tableau"! -

"Plein air" indeed! - I should like to show you one or two little panels!' ⁴

The Pennells recorded that 'many small oils and water-colours were done before the bad weather drove him [Whistler] away' from Pourville. ⁵

Images

Subject

Titles

Several titles have been suggested:

• Possibly 'The Sea, Pourville' (1905, ISSPG). ⁶
• 'The Sea, Pourville, I' (1920, Anderson Galleries). ⁷
• 'The Sea, Pourville, No. 1' (1980, YMSM). ⁸

The preferred title is 'The Sea, Pourville, No. 1': the numbering distinguishes this from The Sea, Pourville, No. 2 y519.

Description

The Sea, Pourville, No. 1, The Hyde Collection

A seascape in horizontal format. The brown beach crosses the foreground at a slight diagonal upwards from lower left. The green sea is flecked with white waves, breaking vigorously on the beach. Glimpses of pale blue sky show between scurrying clouds.

Site

Pourville, near Dieppe, France. Whistler painted numerous seascapes there, including Green and Silver: The Great Sea y518, The Sea, Pourville, No. 2 y519, The Sea, Pourville y520, The Shore, Pourville y521, Grey and Silver: Pourville y522, Grey and Gold: High Tide at Pourville y523, and Blue and Silver: Boat Entering Pourville y524).

Technique

Technique

The Sea, Pourville, No. 1, The Hyde Collection

Green and Silver: The Great Sea, The Hunterian

This is typical of Whistler's panels of Pourville: for instance, Green and Silver: The Great Sea y518 is similar in technique and composition.

The panel, chamfered at the ends, and cradled, is primed in grey. The sky is painted with short soft brush strokes of grey and pale turquoise-blue paint, and the turgid greenish sea is painted more vigorously, with a wavy horizon. The paint is of a thick, creamy consistency on the sea, the brush-marks having a clear raised outline. The grey beach is treated more broadly, with a square brush 4 mm (1/8") wide, with thinner, dryer, paint. The dark tones are emphasized by a neat black butterfly.

Conservation History

The Sea, Pourville, No. 1, photograph 1919

The Sea, Pourville, No. 1, photograph 1980

The Sea, Pourville, No. 1, The Hyde Collection

It has suffered some abrasion and paint loss at the edges, under the frame.

Frame

The frame, not an original Whistler frame, bears the label of E. & A. Milch, New York. It measures 29.2 x 36.8 x 3.5 cm (11 1/2 x 14 1/2 x 1 3/8").

History

Provenance

• 1900/1905: owned by Alexander Arnold Hannay (1858-1927), London.
• 1919: sold by Knoedler, London art dealers, to David Croal Thomson (1855-1930), Barbizon House, London;
• 1919: sold by him to Henrietta Richardson Hind (Mrs C. Lewis Hind) (1862-1938), London dealer;
• 1920: sold at auction, Anderson Galleries, New York, 5-6 February 1920 (lot 115) as 'The Sea, Pourville, I'.
• 1926: sold at auction, Anderson Galleries, New York, 14 April 1926 (lot 52), and bought by Milch, New York dealers, for $2400 as 'The Sea, Pourville';
• 1929: sold by Milch to Louis Hyde (1866-1934) and his wife Charlotte P. Pruyn Hyde (1867-1963);
• 1952: Charlotte Pruyn Hyde established the Hyde Collection as a public foundation;
• 1963: on her death, the painting passed to The Hyde Collection, Glens Falls, NY, as part of The Hyde Collection Trust (Bequest of Charlotte P. Hyde).

It is not known exactly when two paintings of Trouville, this and The Sea, Pourville, No. 2 y519, were bought by A. A. Hannay, but he lent one (probably the latter) to exhibitions in London in 1905 and 1912. Hannay probably sold it to Knoedler's (their account numbers were #6403 and #14698).

Exhibitions

• 1905: Possibly in 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. 64) as 'The Sea, Pourville'.

The Sea, Pourville, No. 1, The Hyde Collection

The Sea, Pourville, No. 2, Munson-Williams- Proctor Institute

A similar seascape, The Sea, Pourville, No. 2 y519, also dates from 1899. They belonged to the same owners in 1905 and 1912 it is not clear which one was lent by A. A. Hannay to exhibitions.

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. 516), plate 330, as 'The Sea, Pourville, No. 1'.

Authored by Whistler

• None.

Catalogues 1855-1905

• Possibly 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. 64) as 'The Sea, Pourville'.

Journals 1855-1905

• None.

Monographs

• None.

Books on Whistler

• Pennell, Elizabeth Robins, and Joseph Pennell, The Life of James McNeill Whistler, 2 vols, London and Philadelphia, 1908, vol. 2, pp. 212-13, repr. f.p. 214.

Books, General

• None.

Catalogues 1906-Present

EXHIBITION:

• Loan Collection of Works by James McNeill Whistler, Tate Gallery, London, 1912 (cat. no. 33).
• Spink, Nesta, Whistler: The Later Years, University of Michigan Art Gallery, Ann Arbor, 1978 (checklist, cat. no. 44).

SALE:

• Anderson Galleries, New York, 5-6 February 1920 (lot 115) as 'The Sea, Pourville, I'.
• Anderson Galleries, New York, 14 April 1926 (lot 52, repr.) as 'The Sea, Pourville'.

Journals 1906-Present

• None.

Websites

• The Hyde Collection website at https://emuseum.hydecollection.org.
• Emuseum website at https://emuseum.hydecollection.org.

Unpublished

• Revillon, Joseph Whistler, Draft Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of J. McN. Whistler, [ca 1945-1955], Glasgow University Library (cat. no. 398).

Other

• None.