TO THE EDITOR:
Sir—I beg that you will kindly print immediately these, my regrets, that General Rush Hawkins should have been spurred into unwonted and unbecoming expression by what I myself read with considerableNew York Herald.bewilderment in theNew York Herald, October 3, under the head of "Whistler's Grievance."
I can assure the gallant soldier that I have no grievance.
Had I known that, when—over what takes the place of wine and walnuts in Holland—I remembered lightly the military methods of the jury, I was being "interviewed," I should have adopted as serious a tone as the original farce would admit of; or I might have even refused to be a party at all to the infliction upon your readers of so old and threadbare a story as that of the raid upon the works of art in the American section of the Universal Exhibition.
Yourcorrespondent, I fancy, felt much more warmly, than did I, wrongs that—who knows?—are doubtless rights in the army; and my sympathies, I confess, are completely with the General, who did only, as he complains, his duty in that state of life in which it had pleased God, and the War Department, to call him, when, according to order, he signed that naïvely authoritative note, circular, warrant, or what not—for he did irretrievably fasten his name to it, whether with pen or print, thereby hopelessly making the letter his own. Thus have we responsibility, like greatness, sometimes thrust upon us.
On receipt of the document I came—I saw the commanding officer, who, until now, I fondly trusted, would ever remember me as pleasantly as I do himself—and, knowing despatch in all military matters to be of great importance, I then and there relieved him of the troublesome etchings, and carried off the painting.
It is a sad shock to me to find that the good General speaks of me without affection, and that he evinces even joy when he says with a view to my entire discomfiture:—"While we rejected only ten of his etchings, the English department rejected eighteen of them, and of the nine accepted, only hung two on the line."
Now, he is wrong!—the General is wrong.
The etchings now hanging in the English section—andperfect is their hanging, notwithstanding General Hawkins's flattering anxiety—are the only ones I sent there.
In the haste and enthusiasm of your interviewer, I have, on this point, been misunderstood.
There was moreover here no question of submitting them to a "competent and impartial jury of his peers"—one of whom, by the way, I am informed upon undoubted authority, had never before come upon an "etching" in his hitherto happy and unchequered Western career.
We all knew that the space allotted to the English department was exceedingly limited, and each one refrained from abusing it. Here I would point out again, hoping this time to be clearly understood, that, had the methods employed in the American camp been more civil, if less military, all further difficulties might have been avoided. Had I been properly advised that the room was less than the demand for place, I would, of course, have instantly begged the gentlemen of the jury to choose, from among the number, what etchings they pleased. So the matter would have ended, and you, Sir, would have been without this charming communication!
The pretty embarrassment of General Hawkins on the occasion of my visit, I myself liked, thinking it seemly,and part of the good form of a West Point man, who is taught that a drum-head court martial—and what else in the experience of this finished officer should so fit him for sitting in judgment upon pictures?—should be presided at with grave and softened demeanour.
If I mistook the General's manner, it is another illusion the less.
And I have, Sir,the honour to be,Your obedient servant,
Butterfly
Amsterdam, Oct. 6.
Mr. Whistler has many things to answer for, and not the least of them is the education of the British Art-Critic. That, at any rate, is the impression left by a little book made up—apparently against the writer's will—of certain of the master's letters andmots.... It isThe Scots Observer, April 5, 1890.useful and pleasant reading; for not only does it prove the painter to have a certain literary talent—of aptness, unexpectedness, above all impertinence—but also it proves him never to have feared the face of art-critical man.... To him the art-critic is nothing if not a person to be educated, with or against the grain; and when he encounters him in the ways of error, he leaps upon him joyously, scalps him in print before the eyes of men, kicks him gaily back into the paths of truth and soberness, and resumes his avocation with that peculiar zest an act of virtue does undoubtedly impart. Indeed, Mr. Whistler, so far from being the critic's enemy, is on the contrary the best friendthat tradesman has ever had. For his function is to make him ridiculous....
... Yes, Mr. Whistler is often "rowdy" and unpleasant; in his last combat with Mr. Oscar Wilde—("Oscar, you have been down the area again")—he comes off a palpable second; his treatment of 'Arry dead and "neglected by the parish" goes far to prove that his sense of smell is not so delicate nor so perfectly trained as his sense of sight....
TO THE EDITOR:
Sir—It is, I suppose, to your pleasant satisfaction in "The Critic's Friend" that I owe the early copy of theScots Observer, pointedThe Scots Observer, April 19, 1890.with proud mark, in the blue pencil of office, whereby the impatient author hastened to indicate the pithy personal paragraphs, that no time should be wasted upon other matter with which the periodical is ballasted.
Exhilarated by the belief that I had been remembered—for vanity's sake let me fancy that you have bestowed upon me your own thought and hand—I plunged forthwith into the underlined article, and read with much amusement your excellent appreciation.
Having forgotten none of your professional manner as art arbiter, may I say that I can picture to myself easily the sad earnestness with which you now point thethick thumb of your editorial refinement in deprecation of my choicer "rowdyism"? And knowing your analytical conscientiousness, I can even understand the humble comfort you take in Oscar's meek superiority; but, for the life of me, I cannot follow your literary intention when you say that my care of "''Arry,' dead and neglected by the parish," goes far to prove that my "sense of smell is not so delicate nor so perfectly trained as" my "sense of sight."
Do you mean that my discovery of the body is the result of a cold in the head? and that, with a finer scent, I should have missed it altogether? or were you only unconsciously remembering and dreamily dipping your pen into the ink of my former description of "'Arry's" chronic catarrh? In any case, I am charmed with what I have just read, and only regret that the ridiculous "Romeike" has not hitherto sent me your agreeable literature.—Also I am, dear Sir, your obedient servant,
Butterfly
Sir—I beg to draw your attention to the contents of your letter to theScots Observer, dated April 12th, in which you state that you "regret the ridiculous Romeike has not hitherto sent me your agreeable literature."
This statement, had it been true, was spiteful and injurious, but being untrue (entirely) it becomes malicious, and I must ask you at once to apologise.
And at the same time to draw your attention to the fact that we have supplied you with 807 cuttings.
We have written to theScots Observerfor an ample apology, or the matter will be placed in our solicitor's hands, and we demand the same of you.
Yours obediently,
ROMEIKE & CURTICE.
J. McN. Whistler, Esq.April 25, 1890.
Sir—If it be not actionable, permit me to say that youreally are delightful!!
Naïveté, like yours, I have never met—even in my long experience with all those, some of whose "agreeable literature" may be, I suppose, in the 807 cuttings you charge me for.
Who, in Heaven's name, ever dreamed of you as an actual person?—or one whom one would mean to insult?
My good Sir, no such intention—believe me—did I, in my wildest of moments, ever entertain.
Yourscalp—if you have such a thing—is safe enough!—and I even think—however great my willingness to assist you—could not possibly appear in the forthcoming Edition.
ButterflyTo Mr.Romeike,April 25.
When the Chairman, in a singularly brilliant and felicitous speech led up to the toast of the evening, Mr. Whistler rose to his feet.
Report of a reply to the toast of the evening at the complimentary dinner given to Mr. Whistler, London, May 1, 1889.
"You must feel that, for me," said Mr. Whistler, "it is no easy task to reply under conditions of which I have so little habit. We are all even too conscious that mine has hitherto, I fear, been the gentle answer that sometimes turneth not away wrath."
Sunday Times, May 5, 1889.
"Gentlemen," said he, "this is an age of rapid results, when remedies insist upon their diseases, that science shall triumph and no time be lost; and so have we also rewards that bring with them their own virtue. It would ill become me to question my fitness for the position it has pleased this distinguished company to thrust upon me."
"It has before now been borne in upon me, that in surroundings of antagonism, I may have wrapped myself, for protection, in a species of misunderstanding—as thatother traveller drew closer about him the folds of his cloak the more bitterly the winds and the storm assailed him on his way. But, as with him, when the sun shone upon him in his path, his cloak fell from his shoulders, so I, in the warm glow of your friendship, throw from me all former disguise, and, making no further attempt to hide my true feeling, disclose to you my deep emotion at such unwonted testimony of affection and faith."
TO THE EDITOR:
Pall Mall Gazette, July 28, 1891.
Sir,—May I request that you allow me to make known, through your influential paper, the fact that the canvas, now shown as a completed work of mine, at Messrs. Dowdeswell's, representing three draped figures in a conservatory, is a painting long ago barely begun, and thrown aside for destruction?
Also I am in no way responsible for the taste of the frame with its astonishments of plush! and varied gildings.
I think it not only just to myself to make this statement, but right that the public should be warned against the possible purchase of a picture in no way representative, and, in its actual condition, absolutely worthless.—I am, Sir, your obedient servant,
Butterfly
Chelsea, July 27, 1891.
TO THE EDITOR:
Sir,—I have read with interest Mr. Whistler's letter in your issue of July 28. I happened to be at Messrs. Dowdeswell's galleries the otherPall Mall Gazette, Aug. 1, 1891.day and saw the picture he refers to. It was not on public exhibition, but was in one of their private rooms, and was brought out for my inspectionà proposof a conversation we were having. Now, so far from Messrs. Dowdeswell showing it as a "completed work," they distinctly spoke of it as unfinished; nor can I imagine any one acquainted with Mr. Whistler's works speaking of any of them as "completed!" In "L'Envoi" of the catalogue of his exhibition held at Messrs. Dowdeswell's a short time ago I find the following paragraph from his pen:—"The work of the master reeks not of the sweat of the brow—suggests no effort—andis finished from its beginning." The only inference possible is either that Mr. Whistler is not a master,or that the work is finished! He has, however, spent what time he could spare from his literary labours in endeavouring to induce the world to believe that the slightest scratch from his pen is worthy to rank with "Las Lanzas," and I am therefore surprised to learn that he has altered his opinion. Still, I quite agree with him when he tells us that some of his work is "absolutely worthless!"—I am, sir, more in sorrow than in anger, your obedient servant,
W. C.
July 31, 1891.
TO THE EDITOR:
Pall Mall Gazette, Aug. 4, 1891.
Sir,—My letter should have met with no reply at all. It was a statement—authoritative and unanswerable, if there ever were one.
Because of the attention drawn to it, in the press, I felt called upon to advise the Public that one ofmy own worksis condemnedby myself. Final this, one would fancy!
That the accidental owners of the Gallery should introduce themselves to the situation, is of a most marked irrelevancy. They come incomme un cheveu sur la soupe, to be removed at once.
The dealer's business is to buy and sell. In the course of such traffic, these same busy picture bodies, without consulting me, put upon the market a painting that I, the author, intended to efface—and, thanks to your courtesy, I have been enabled to say so effectually in your journal.
Allalong have I carefully destroyed plates, torn up proofs, and burned canvases, that the truth of the quoted word shall prevail, and that the future collector shall be spared the mortification of cataloguing his pet mistakes.
To destroy, is to remain.
What is commercial irritation beside a clean canvas?
What is a gentlemanly firm in Bond Street beside Eternity?—I am, sir, your obedient servant,
Butterfly
Chelsea, August 1, 1891.
NOCTURNES,MARINES,ANDCHEVALET PIECES
NOCTURNES,MARINES,
AND
CHEVALET PIECES
A CATALOGUE
Butterfly
SMALL COLLECTIONKINDLY LENTTHEIR OWNERS
SMALL COLLECTION
KINDLY LENT
THEIR OWNERS
"Ido not know when so much amusement has been afforded to the British public as by Mr. Whistler's pictures."
Speech of the Attorney-General of England.Westminster, Nov. 16, 1878.
1.—NOCTURNE.
Grey and Silver—Chelsea Embankment—Winter.
Lent by F. G. Orchar, Esq.
"With the exception, perhaps, of one of Mr. Whistler's meaningless canvases, there is nothing that is actually provocative of undue mirth or ridicule."
City Press.
"In some of the Nocturnes the absence, not only of definition, but of gradation, would point to the conclusion that they are but engaging sketches. In them welook in vain for all the delicate differences of light and hue which the scenes depicted present."
F. Wedmore, "Four Masters of Etching."
2.—SYMPHONY IN WHITE, No. III.
Lent by Louis Huth, Esq.
"It is not precisely a symphony in white—one lady has a yellowish dress and brown hair and a bit of blue ribbon, the other has a red fan, and there are flowers and green leaves. There is a girl in white on a white sofa, but even this girl has reddish hair; and of course there is the flesh colour of the complexions."
P. G. Hamerton, "Saturday Review."
"Mr. Whistler appears as eccentrically as ever.... Art is not served by freaks of resentment.... We hold him deeply to blame that these figures are badly drawn.
"... 'Taste,' which is mind working in Art, would, even if it could at all conceive them, utterly reject the vulgarities of Mr. Whistler with regard to form, and never be content with what suffices him in composition."—Athenæum.
"Painting, or art generally, as such, with all its technicalities, difficulties, and particular ends, is nothing buta noble and expressive language, invaluable as the vehicle of thought, but by itself nothing."
John Ruskin, Esq., Art Professor,"Modern Painters."
3.—CHELSEA IN ICE.
Lent by Madame Venturi.
"We are not sure but that it would be something like insult to our readers to say more about these 'things.' They must surely be meant in jest; but whether the public have chiefly to thank Mr. Whistler or the Managers of the Grosvenor Gallery for playing off on them this sorry joke we do not know, nor greatly care.Meliora canamus!"—Knowledge.
4.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Gold—Old Battersea Bridge.
Lent by Robert H. C. Harrison, Esq.
"His Nocturne in Blue and Gold, No. 3, might have been called, with a similar confusion of terms: A Farce in Moonshine, with half-a-dozen dots."—Life.
"The picture representing a night scene on Battersea Bridge has no composition and detail. A day, or a day and a half, seems a reasonable time within whichto paint it. It shows no finish—it is simply a sketch."
Mr. Jones, R.A.—Evidence in Court,Nov. 16, 1878.
5.—THE LANGE LEIZEN—OF THE SIX MARKS.
Purple and Rose.
Lent by J. Leathart.
"Mr. Whistler paints subjects sadly below the merit of his pencil."—London Review.
"A worse specimen of humanity than could be found on the oldest piece of china in existence."
Reader.
"The hideous forms we find in his Chinese vase painteress ... an ostentatious slovenliness of execution ... objects as much out of perspective as the great blue vase in the foreground,&c....&c....
"It is Mr. Whistler's way to choose people and things for painting which other painters would turn from, and to combine these oddly chosen materials as no other painter would choose to combine them. He should learn that eccentricity is not originality, but the caricature of it."—Times.
6.—NOCTURNE.
Trafalgar Square—Snow.
Lent by Albert Moore, Esq.
"The word 'impressionist' has come to have a bad meaning in art. Visions of Whistler come before you when you hear it. Such visions are not of the best possible augury, for who loves a nightmare?"
Oracle.
"Like the landscape art of Japan, they are harmonious decorations, and a dozen or so of such engaging sketches placed in the upper panels of a lofty apartment would afford a justifiable and welcome alternative even to noble tapestries or Morris wallpapers."—F. Wedmore, "Four Masters of Etching."
7.—NOCTURNE—BLACK AND GOLD.
The Fire Wheel.
"Mr. Whistler has 'a sweet little isle of his own' in the shape of an ample allowance of wall space all to himself for the display of his six most noticeable works: 'Nocturnes' in black and gold, in blue and silver, 'Arrangements' in black and brown, and 'Harmonies' in amber and black.
"These weird productions—enigmas sometimes so occultthat Œdipus might be puzzled to solve them—need much subtle explanation."—Daily Telegraph.
8.—ARRANGEMENT IN BLACK AND BROWN.
The Fur Jacket.
"Mr. Whistler has whole-length portraits, or rather the shadows of people, shapes suggestive of good examples of portraiturewhen completed. They are exhibited to illustrate a theory peculiar to the artist. One is entitled An Arrangement in 'Black and Brown.'"—Daily Telegraph.
"Mr. Whistler is anything but a robust and balanced genius."—Times.
"Whistler, with three portraits which he is pleased to call 'Arrangements,' and which look like ghosts."
Truth.
"Some figure pieces, which this artist exhibits as 'harmonies' in this, that, or the other, being, as they are, mere rubs-in of colour, have no claim to be regarded as pictures."—Scotsman.
"We are threatened with a Whistler exhibition. The periodical inflictions with which this gentleman tries the patience of a long-suffering public generally takesome fantastic form to attract attention. It is an evidence of the painter's worldly acuteness that this should be so, for public attention may be drawn by such outbursts of eccentricity to such work as would never impress sensible people on its bare merit."—Oracle.
9.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Silver.
Lent by Mrs. Leyland.
"It seems to us a pity that an artist of Mr. Whistler's known ability should exhibit such an extraordinary collection of pictile nightmares."—Society.
"Mr. Bowen:'Do you consider detail and composition essential to a work of art?'
"Mr. Jones:'Most certainly I do.'
"Mr. Bowen:'Then what detail and composition do you find in this "Nocturne"?'
"Mr. Jones:'Absolutely none.'
"Mr. Bowen:'Do you think two hundred guineas a large price for that picture?'
"Mr. Jones:'Yes, when you think of the amount of earnest work done for a smaller sum.'"
Evidence of Mr. Jones, R.A.,Westminster, Nov. 16, 1878.
10.—NOCTURNE.
In Black and Gold—The Falling Rocket.
"A dark bluish surface, with dots on it, and the faintest adumbrations of shape under the darkness, is gravely called a Nocturne in Black and Gold."
Knowledge.
"His Nocturne, black and gold, 'The Falling Rocket,' shows such wilful and headlong perversity that one is almost disposed to despair of an artist who, in a sane moment [sic], could send such a daub to any exhibition."—Telegraph.
"For Mr. Whistler's own sake, no less than for the protection of the purchaser, Sir Coutts Lindsay ought not to have admitted works into the gallery in which the ill-educated conceit of the artist so nearly approached the aspect of wilful imposture. I have seen, and heard, much of cockney impudence before now, but never expected to hear a coxcomb ask two hundred guineas for flinging a pot of paint in the public's face."
Professor John Ruskin,July 2, 1877.
"The 'Nocturne in black and gold' is not a serious work to me."
Mr. Firth, R.A.—Evidence at Westminster,Nov. 16, 1878.
"The'Nocturne in black and gold,' I do not think a serious work of art."
The Art Critic of the "Times."Evidence at Westminster, Nov. 16, 1878.
"The Nocturne in black and gold has not the merit of the other two pictures, and it would be impossible to call it a serious work of art. Mr. Whistler's picture is only one of the thousand failures to paint night. The picture is not worth two hundred guineas."
Evidence of Mr. Jones, R.A.Westminster, Nov. 16, 1878.
11.—NOCTURNE—OPAL AND SILVER.
Lent by H. Theobald, Esq.
"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."—Knowledge.
"The blue and black smudges which purport to depict the 'Thames at Night.'"—Life.
12.—HARMONYIN GREEN AND ROSE.
The Music Room.
Lent by Madame Reveillon.
"He paints in soot-colours and mud-colours, but, far from enjoying primary hues, has little or no perception of the loveliness of secondary or tertiary colour."—Merrie England.
13.—CREPUSCULE IN FLESH COLOUR AND GREEN.
Valparaiso.
Lent by Graham Robertson, Esq.
"Now, the best achievement of The Impressionist School, to which Mr. Whistler belongs [sic], is the rendering of air—not air made palpable and comparatively easy to paint, by fog—but atmosphere which is the medium of light."—Merrie England.
14.—CAPRICE IN PURPLE AND GOLD.
The Gold Screen.
Lent by Cyril Flower, Esq., M.P.
"I take it to be admitted by those who do not conclude that art is necessarily great which has the misfortune to be unacceptable, that it is not by his paintings so much as by his etchings that Mr. Whistler's name may aspire to live."—F. Wedmore.
15.—SYMPHONYIN GREY AND GREEN.
The Ocean.
Lent by Mrs. Peter Taylor.
"In Mr. Whistler's picture, 'Symphony in Grey and Green: The Ocean,' the composition is ugly, the sky opaque, the suggestion of sea leaden and without light or motion."—Times.
"Mr. Whistler continues these experiments in colour which are now known as 'Symphonies.' It may be questioned whether these performances are to be highly valued, except as feats accomplished under needless and self-imposed restrictions—much as writing achieved by the feet of a penman who has not been deprived of the use of his hands."—Graphic.
Butterfly
"We can paint a cat or a fiddle, so that they look as if we could take them up; but we cannot imitate the Ocean or the Alps. We can imitate fruit, but not a tree; flowers, but not a pasture; cut-glass, but not the rainbow."—John Ruskin, Esq., Teacher of Art.
16.—NOCTURNE.
Grey and Gold—Chelsea Snow.
Lent by Alfred Chapman, Esq.
"Mr. Whistler sends two of his studies of moonlight, in which form is eschewed for harmonies of 'Greyand Gold' and 'Blue and Silver;' and which, for the crowd of exhibition visitors, resolve themselves into riddles or mystifications.... In a word, painting to Mr. Whistler is the exact correlative of music, as vague, as purely emotional, as released from all functions of representation.
"He is really building up art out of his own imperfections [sic!] instead of setting himself to supply them."—Times.
17.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Silver—Battersea Reach.
Lent by W. G. Rawlinson, Esq.
"J. M. Whistler is here again with his nocturnes."
Scotsman.
18.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Silver—Chelsea.
Lent by W. C. Alexander, Esq.
"Mr. Whistler confines himself to two small canvases of the nocturne kind. One is covered with smudgy blue and the other with dirty black."
Saturday Review.
*/
"A reputation, for a time, imperilled by original absurdity"—F. Wedmore, "Academy."
"Ithink Mr. Wedmore takes the Nocturnes and Arrangements too seriously. They are merely first beginnings of pictures, differing from ordinary first beginnings in having no composition. The great originality was in venturing to exhibit them."
P. G. Hamerton, "Academy."
19.—NOCTURNE.
Grey and Gold—Westminster Bridge.
Lent by the Hon. Mrs. Percy Wyndham.
"Two of Mr. Whistler's 'colour symphonies'—a 'Nocturne in Blue and Gold' and a 'Nocturne in Black and Gold.' If he did not exhibit these as pictures under peculiar and, what seems to most people, pretentious titles, they would be entitled to their due meed of admiration [sic!]. But they only come one step nearer pictures than delicately graduated tints on a wall-paper do.
"He must not attempt, with that happy, half-humorous audacity which all his dealings with his own works suggests, to palm off his deficiencies upon us as manifestations of power."—Daily Telegraph.
20.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Gold—Southampton Water.
Lent by Alfred Chapman, Esq.
"There is always danger that efforts of this class may degenerate into the merely tricky and meretricious; and already a suspicion arises that the artist's eccentricity is somewhat too premeditated and self-conscious."—Graphic.
21.—BLUE AND SILVER.
Blue Wave—Biarritz.
Lent by Gerald Potter, Esq.
"Mr. Whistler is possessed of much audacity and eccentricity, and these are useful qualities in an artist who desires to be talked about. When he comes out into the open, and deals with daylight, we find these studies to be only the first washes of pictures. He leaves off where other artists begin. He shirks all the difficulties ahead, and asks the spectator to complete the picture himself."—Daily Telegraph.
"The absence, seemingly, of any power, such as the great marine painters had, of drawing forms of water, whether in a broad and wind-swept tidal river or on the high seas...."
F. Wedmore,
"Nineteenth Century."
22.—ARRANGEMENTIN BLACK AND BROWN.
Miss Rosa Corder.
Lent by Graham Robertson, Esq.
"It is bad enough, in all conscience, to be caricatured by the gifted pencil and brushes of the admirable Whistler; and it is surely adding insult to injury to describe the victims and sufferers as 'Arrangements.' With regard to Mr. Whistler's Symphonies, Harmonies, and so on, we will relate a parable. Here it is:—A lively young donkey sang a sweet love song to the dawn, and so disturbed all the neighbourhood, that the neighbours went to the donkey and begged him to desist. He continued his braying for some time, and then ended with what appeared, to his own ears, a flourish of surpassing brilliancy.
"Will you be good enough to give over that hideous noise?" said the neighbours.
"'Good Olympus!' said the donkey, 'did you say hideous noise? Why, that is a "Symphony," which means a concord of sweet sounds, as you may see by referring to any dictionary.'
"'But,' said the neighbours, 'we donotthink that "Symphony" is the word to describe your performance. "Cacophony" would be more correct, and that means "a bad set of sounds."'
"'Howabsurdly you talk!' said the donkey. 'I will refer it to my fellow-asses, and let them decide.'
"The donkeys decided that the young donkey's song was a most symphonious and harmonious, sweet song; so he continues to bray as melodiously as ever. There is, we believe, a moral to this parable, if we only knew what it was. Perhaps the piercing eye of the 'NocturnalWhistler' may find it out."—Echo.
"Miss Rosa Corder, and Mr. H. Irving as Philip, are two large blotches of dark canvas. When I have time I am going again to find out which is Rose and which is Irving.
"The rest of the collection is marred by the impatience which has prevented his achieving any finished work of Art."—Weekly Press.
23.—"HARMONY IN GREY AND GREEN."
Portrait of Miss Alexander.
Lent by W. Alexander, Esq.
"A sketch of Miss Alexander, in which much must be imagined."—Standard.
"There is character in it, but it is unpleasant character. Of anything like real flesh tones the painting is quite innocent."—Builder.
"Butwhat can we say of Mr. Whistler? His portrait of Miss Alexander is certainly one of the strangest and most eccentric specimens of Portraiture we ever saw. If we were unacquainted with his singular theories of Art, we should imagine he had merely made a sketch and left it, before the colours were dry, in a room where chimney-sweeps were at work.... Nobody who sets any value upon the roses and lilies that adorn the cheeks of our blooming girls can accept such murky tints as these as representative of a young English lady"—Era.
"It is simply a disagreeable presentment of a disagreeable young lady."—Liverpool Weekly Mercury.
"Mr. Whistler again appears on the walls with a characteristic full-length life-size portrait of a girl, Miss Alexander.
"This work is devoid of colour, being arranged in Black and White and intermediate tones of grey. The general effect is dismal in the extreme, and one cannot but wonder how an artist of undoubted talent should wilfully persist in such perversities of judgment."—Western Daily Mercury.
"Miss Alexander, almost in Black and White, and about the most unattractive piece of work in the Galleries."—Edinburgh Daily Review.
"A'gruesomeness in Grey.'
"Well, bless thee, J. Whistler! We do not hanker after your brush system. Farewell!"—Punch.
"'An Arrangement in Silver and Bile.'
"The artist has represented this bilious young lady as looking haughty in a dirty white dress, a grey polonaise, bound by a grey green sash, a grey hat, with the most unhealthy green feather; furthermore, she wears black shoes with green bows, and stands defiantly on a grey floor cloth, opposite a grey wall with a black dado. Two dyspeptic butterflies hover wearily above her head in searchof a bit of colour... evidently losing heart at the grey expanse around.... A picture should charm, not depress, it should tend to elevate our thoughts!"—Society.
"This picture represents a child of ten, and is called a harmony in grey and green, but the prevailing tone is a rather unpleasant yellow, and the complexion of the face is wholly unchildlike."—Echo.
"A large etching in oil, a 'Rhapsody in Raw Child and Cobwebs,' by Mr. Whistler."—Artist.
"Mr. Whistler is as spectral as ever in an unattractive portrait of an awkward little girl, happily not rendered additionally ridiculous by a musical title."
Bedford Observer.
"Flatteryis objectionable in art as elsewhere, but some portrait painters seem to find it impossible to tell the truth without being rude."—Academy.
"Mr. Whistler has a portrait of a young lady that excites absolute astonishment.
"What charm can there be in such colours as these? What effect do they produce which would not have been better by warmer and less repulsive tints?"
Leeds Mercury.
"Mr. Whistler's single contribution is a child's portrait, posed and painted in a rather distant, if obsequious, imitation of the manner of Velasquez, the great difference being that whereas the Spaniard's work is most remarkable for supreme distinction, the present portrait is uncompromisingly vulgar."
Magazine of Art.
24.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Silver—Bognor.
Lent by Alfred Chapman, Esq.
"We protest against those foppish airs and affectations by which Mr. Whistler impresses on us his contempt of public opinion. In landscape he contributes what he persists in calling a Nocturne in 'Blue and Silver,'and a Nocturne in 'Black and Gold' which is a mere insult to the intelligence of his admirers. It is very difficult to believe that Mr. Whistler is not openly laughing at us."—Pall Mall Gazette.
25.—NOCTURNE.
Battersea Reach.
Lent by Alfred Chapman, Esq.
"Under the same roof with Mr. Whistler's strange productions is the collection of animal paintings done by various artists for the proprietors of theGraphic, and very refreshing it is to turn into this agreeably lighted room and rest on comfortable settees whilst looking at 'Mother Hubbard's Dog,' or the sweet little pussy cats in the 'Happy Family.'"
Liverpool Courier.
"A few smears of colour, such as a painter might make in cleaning his paint brushes, and which, neither near at hand nor far off, neither from one side nor from the other, nor from in front, do more than vaguely suggest a shore and bay, was described as a Note in Blue and Brown.... One who found these pictures other than insults to his artistic sense could never be reached by reasoning."—Knowledge.
26.—GREENAND GREY.
Channel.
Lent by Alfred Chapman, Esq.
27.—PINK AND GREY.
Chelsea.
Lent by Cyril Flower, Esq., M.P.
"... of the insolent madness of that school of which Mr. Whistler is the most peccant—we wish we could say the only—representative."—Knowledge.
28.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Gold—Valparaiso.
Lent by Alexander Ionides, Esq.
"'A Nocturne' or two by Mr. Whistler—and here we have it in the usual style—a daub of blue and a spot or two of yellow to illustrate ships at sea on a dark night, and a splash and splutter of brightness on a black ground to depict a display of fireworks."
Norwich Argus.
29.—GREENAND GREY.
The Oyster Smacks—Evening.
Lent by Alexander Ionides, Esq.
"Other people paint localities; Mr. Whistler makes artistic experiments."—Academy.
30.—GREY AND BLACK.
Sketch.
Lent by Alexander Ionides, Esq.
31.—BROWN AND SILVER.
Old Battersea Bridge.
Lent by Alexander Ionides, Esq.
"Nor can I imagine any one acquainted with Mr. Whistler's works speaking of any of them as 'completed.'"—Letter to "Pall Mall."
32.—NOCTURNE.
Black and Gold.
33.—SYMPHONYIN WHITE, No. 11.
The Little White Girl.
Lent by Gerald Potter, Esq.
"Another picture, 'The Little White Girl' was exhibited about the same time, containing the germ of that paradoxical Whistlerian humour lately so fully exemplified in various places about London. It was called 'A Little White Girl' in the catalogue, and yet its colour generally was grimy grey."—London.
"The white girl was standing at the side of a mirror where the laws of incidence and refraction would unfortunately not permit her to see her own beauty."
Merrie England.
34.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Silver—Cremorne Lights.
Lent by Gerald Potter, Esq.
"I have expressed, and still adhere to the opinion, that these pictures only come one step nearer than a delicately tinted wall paper."
The Art Critic of the "Times"Evidence at Westminster, Nov. 16, 1878.
"Paintings, like some of the 'Nocturnes' and some of the 'Arrangements,' are defended only by a generousself-deception, when it is urged for them that they will be famous to-morrow because they are not famous to-day."
Mr. Wedmore,
"Nineteenth Century."
35.—GREY AND SILVER.
Chelsea Wharf.
Lent by Gerald Potter, Esq.
36.—GREY AND SILVER.
Old Battersea Reach.
Lent by Madame Coronio.
37.—BLUE AND SILVER.
"He has no atmosphere and no light. Instead of air he studies various kinds of fog—and his 'values' are the relative powers of darkness, not of light. He never paints a sky."—Merrie England.
38.—NOCTURNE.
Blue and Gold—St. Mark's, Venice.
Lent by Monsieur Gallimard.
"The mannerism of Canaletto is the most degraded that I know in the whole range of art....
"... It gives no one single architectural ornament, however near—somuch form as might enable us even to guess at its actual one; and this I say not rashly, for I shall prove it by placing portions of detail accurately copied from Canaletto side by side with engravings from the daguerreotype.
Butterfly"... There isnostone drawing,novitality of architecture like Prout's."—Prof. Ruskin, Art Teacher.
"In Mr. Whistler's productions one might safely say that there is no culture."—Athenæum.
"Imagine a man of genius following in the wake of Whistler!"—Oracle.
"The measure of originality has at times been overrated through the innocent error of the budding amateur, who in the earlier stage of his enlightenment confuses the beginning with the end, accepts the intention for the adequate fulfilment, and exalts an adroit sketch into the rank of a permanent picture."
F. Wedmore, "Four Masters of Etching."
39.—CREPUSCULE IN OPAL.
Lent by Fred. Jameson, Esq.
"Mr. Whistler is eminently an 'Impressionist.' The final business of art is not with 'impressions.' We want not 'impressionists' but 'expressionists,' men who can say what they mean because they know what they have heard. [Sic!]
"Wewant not always the blotches and misty suggestions of the impressionist,&c."—Artist.
40.—HARMONY IN FLESH COLOUR AND GREEN.
The Balcony.
Lent by John Cavafy, Esq., M.D.
"It is perhaps a little difficult for any critic to be quite absolutely just to Mr. Whistler at present, on account of his eccentricities and his apparent determination to make us forget the qualities of the artist in our amusement at the freaks and fancies of the man."—P. G. Hamerton, in the "Academy."
"A Variation in Flesh Colour and Green.The damsels—they were not altogether meritorious. The draughtsmanship displayed in them was anything but 'searching.'"—F. Wedmore.
"At about the same time the artist exhibited other sketches (we ask indulgence for the word) of a like character, notes of impressions of white dresses, furniture, balconies, and incidental faces and figures."
Merrie England.
"The 'evolution principle' has been visibly in operation for a dozen years or so in the successive Whistlers put before the public during that time. First of allwe remember pictures of ladies pale and attenuate poring with tender interest over vermilion scarfs. The taint of realism was on them, but even in them were hints of the pensive humour that was to fetch mankind in the well-known 'arrangements' at a later time. A good deal was left to the spectator's imagination even in them."—London.
"We note his predilections for dinginess and dirt."
Weekly Press.
41.—ARRANGEMENT IN BLACK.
La Dame au Brodequin Jaune.
"All these pictures strike us alike.
"They seem like half-materialised ghosts at a spiritualisticséance. I cannot help wondering when they will gain substance and appear more clearly out of their environing fog, or when they will melt altogether from my attentive gaze."—Echo.
"He has placed one of his portraits on an asphalte floor and against a coal-black background, the whole apparently representing a dressy woman in aninfernoof the worldly."—Merrie England.
"Mr. Whistler has a capricious rendering of a lady dressed in black, in a black recess, on a dark green floor. She is turning affectedly half-round towards thespectator as she buttons thegant de suèdeupon her left hand,&c.&c.Its obvious affectations render the work displeasing."—Morning Advertiser.
42.—ARRANGEMENT IN GREY AND BLACK.
Thomas Carlyle.
Lent by the Corporation of Glasgow.
"The purpose of this picture is a form of hero-worship which would certainly not have received the approbation of Carlyle.
"... This very doubtful masterpiece—unhappy ratepayers of Glasgow."—Dundee Advertiser.
"... and to have recorded on a doleful canvas the head and figure of Carlyle...."—F. Wedmore.
"... The rugged simplicity of Mr. Carlyle ... to have painted these things alone—however strange their mannerism or incomplete their technique."
Nineteenth Century.
"The portentous purchase by the civic authorities of Mr. Whistler's senile Carlyle renders it necessary for that section of the community who are not enamoured of Impressionism to watch with some vigilance the next steps taken by that body towards the formation of the permanent collection.
"Aportrait which omits entirely to bring out the individuality of the sitter, stands but little chance of recognition even from immediate posterity."
Letter to "Glasgow Herald," March 4, 1892.
"We cannot forget his encounter some years ago with Mr. Ruskin, nor the contemptuous terms in which that foremost of art critics denounced his work. It has been left to Glasgow to rectify Mr. Ruskin's blunder in this matter, and it vindicates the merits of the American artist over whose artistic vagaries—his nocturnes and harmonies in blue and gold—thewhole press of Britainmade merry."
Dundee Advertiser.
"There is, among portraits of great writers, Mr. Whistler's portrait of Carlyle. It is a picture whose story is complete, whose honours have been gathered abroad—in Paris, in Brussels, in Munich. Its destiny has been accomplished; it belongs to the City of Glasgow, and from the corporation of that city was borrowed for the Victorian Exhibition. The corporation lent it in good faith; the borrowers have treated it with all the indignity it is in their power to bestow on it.
"Could there be a better epitome of the recent history of art in England? One work of Mr. Whistler's isreceived with high honour in the Luxembourg on its way to the Louvre; and at that very moment another work of his, worthy to rank with the first, is hoist with equally high disrespect to the ceiling of a gallery in London."—N. Y. Tribune, Jan. 17, 1892.
43.—HARMONY IN PINK AND GREY.
Portrait of Lady Meux.
Lent by Sir Henry Meux.
"Portrait of Mrs. Meux, in which it was not so much the face as the figure and the movement that came to be deftly suggested, if hardly elaborately expressed."—F. Wedmore.
"All Mr. Whistler's work is unfinished. It is sketchy. He no doubt possesses artistic qualities, and he has got appreciation of qualities of tone; but he is not complete, and all his works are in the nature of sketching."
The Art Critic of the "Times,"Evidence at Westminster, Nov. 16, 1878.
44.—ARRANGEMENT IN GREY AND BLACK.
Portrait of the Painter's Mother.
Photograph of Picture.
"This canvas is large and much of it vacant.
"A dim, cold light fills the room, where the flat, grey wallis only broken by a solitary picture in black and white; a piece of foldless, creaseless, Oriental flowered crape hangs from the cornice. And here, in this solemn chamber, sits the lady in mournful garb. The picture has found few admirers among the thousands who seek to while away the hours at Burlington House, and for this result the painter has only to thank himself."—Times.
"'Arrangement in Grey and Black: Portrait of the Painter's Mother,' is another of Mr. Whistler's experiments.
"It is not a picture, and we fail to discover anyobjectthat the artist can have in view in restricting himself almost entirely to black and grey."—Examiner.
"The 'arrangement' is stiff and ugly enough to repel many."—Hour.
"Before such pictures as the full-length portraits by Mr. Whistler, critic and spectator are alike puzzled. Criticism and admiration seem alike impossible, and the mind vacillates between a feeling that the artist is playing a practical joke upon the spectator, or that the painter is suffering from some peculiar optical delusion. After all, there are certain accepted canons about what constitutes good drawing, good colour, and good painting, and when an artist deliberately sets himselfto ignore or violate all of these, it is desirable that his work should not be classed with that of ordinary artists."—Times.
"He that telleth a tale to ... Carlyle's majority speaketh to one in a slumber: when he hath told his tale he will say, What is the matter?"
Butterfly
RÉSUMÉ.
"It is impossible to take Mr. Whistler seriously."
Advertiser.
"A combination of circumstances has, within the last year or two, brought the name and work of Mr. Whistler into special publicity....
"At the Grosvenor Gallery the less desirable of his designs aroused the inconsiderate ire of a man of genius and splendid authority.
"Ifit be Mr. Whistler's theory that that which all the world of greatest artists (?) has mistaken for mere means has been in very seriousness the end, then the aim of Art is immeasurably lowered!...
"If there be anything to the point, it is to implore us to take a stone for bread, and the grammar of a language in place of its literature.
"Mr. Whistler has assumed that it is only the painter who is occupied with art.... Unless he is a very exceptional man.... If he is not of the school of Fulham, he is of the school of Holland Park, or of the Grove End Road.
"Has he, like Mr. Ruskin, devoted thirty years of a poet's life to the Galleries of Europe?
"Has he, like Diderot, inquired curiously into the meaning and message of this thing and that? Andappreciating Greuze, been able toappreciate Chardin?(!!)"
Mr. Wedmore,"Nineteenth Century."
"Mr. Ruskin's whole body of doctrine, from the very young days, in which he took the duty of teacher, on to his old age, was contradicted by Mr. Whistler's pictures."—Merrie England.
"Inpainting, his success is infrequent, and it is limited.
"In painting, Mr. Whistler is an impressionist. His best painting betrays something of that almost modern sensitiveness to pleasurable juxtapositions of delicate colour which we admire in Orchardson, in Linton (sic!), and in Albert Moore; it betrays, sometimes, as in a portrait of Miss Alexander, a deftness of brushwork in the wave of a feather, in the curve of a hat ... and of high art qualities it betrays not much besides.
"It is true that the originality of his painted work is somewhat apt to be dependent on the innocent error that confuses the beginning with the end, accepts the intention for the execution, and exalts an adroit sketch into the rank of a permanent picture."
F. Wedmore, "Four Masters of Etching."
"I think Mr. Whistler had great powers at first, which he has not since justified."
Mr. Jones, R.A.Evidence in Court, Nov. 16, 1878.
"The right time and the right place for the conspicuousness of an Impressionist were undoubtedly England, and the moment when Mr. Whistler rose up and astonished her.
"InParis he was one of many, though he would be at peace in France, that peace would not be unattended with a certain comparative obscurity.
"Inconspicuous solitude would not have had the same charms for him."—Merrie England.
"Au musée du Luxembourg, vient d'être placé, deM. Whistler, le splendidePortrait de Mme Whistler mère, une œuvre destinée à l'éternité des admirations, une œuvre sur laquelle la consécration des siècles semble avoir mis la patine d'un Rembrandt, d'un Titien ou d'un Velasquez."—Chronique des Beaux-Arts.
MORAL.
"ModernBritish(!) art will now be represented in the National Gallery of the Luxembourg by one of the finest paintings due to the brush of anEnglish(!) artist, namely, Mr. Whistler's portrait of his mother."—Illustrated London News.
Butterfly