AMES MCN FT I LT WHISTLER NTEXT ESSAYS FROM THE WHISTLER CENTENARY SYMPOSIUM UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW, 2003 Edited hj Lee Gbzer, Margaret F, MacDoriald, Linda Merrill, and Nigel Thorp FREER GALLERY OF ART OCCASIONAL PAPERS NEW SERSES, VOL. 2 S M I T H S O N 1 A N I N S T 3 T U T I O N WASHINGTON, DrC,.y::M^ FREER GALLERY OF ART OCCASIONAL PAPERS NEW SERIES, VOL. 2 Freer Gallery of Art FREER GALLERY OF ART OCCASIONAL PAPERS ORIGINAL SERIES, 1947-1971 A. G. Wenley, llic Grand Empress Dowager Wen Ming and the Northern Wei Necropolis at Fang Shan, Vol I, no. I, 1947 Burns A. Stubbs, Paintings. Pastels, Drawings, Prints, and Copper Plates by and Attrihnted to Aitieriean and European Artists. Together with a List of Original Whistlenanti in the Freer Gallery of Art, Vol. 1, no. 2, 1948 Richard Ettinghausen, Studies in Muslim konograph]' I: Ihe Unicorn, Vol. 1, no. 3, 1950 Burns A. Stubbs, James McNeUl Whistler: A Biographical Outline, Illustrated from the Collections of the Freer Gallery of Art, Vol. 1 , no. 4, 1950 Georg Steindortf, A Royal Head from Ancient Egypt, Vol. 1, no. 5. 1951 lohn Alexander Pope, Fourteenth-Century Blue-and-Wliitc: A Group oj Chinese Porcelains in the Topkapi Sarayi Miizesi, Istanbul. Vol. 2, no. 1, 1952 Ruthertord f. Gettens and Bertha M. Usilton, Abstracts of Technical Studies in Art and Archaeology I94i-I952, Vol. 2, no. 2, 1955 Wen Fong, Vie Lohans and a Bridge to Heaven, Vol. 3, no. 1, 1958 Calligrapliers ami Painters: A Treatise by Qddi Ahmad. Son of Mir-Munshi. circa a.h. 1015/ A.D. 1606, translated from the Persian by Vladimir Minorsky, Vol. 3, no. 2, 1959 Richard Edwards, Li Ti, Vol. 3, no. 3, 1967 Rutherford J. Gettens, Roy S. Clarke |r., and W. T. Chase, Two Early Chinese Bronze Weapons with Meteoritic Iron Blades, Vol. 4, no. 1, 1971 INTERIM SERIES, I99,S-2()02, PUBLISHED BY BOTH THE FREER GALLERY OF ART AND THE ARTHUR M. SACKLER GALLERY Ebba Koch, Dara-Shikoli Shooting Nilgais: Hunt and Landscape in Mughal Painting, Vol. 1, 1998 Gauvm Alexander Bailey, Tlie jesuits and the Grand Mogul: Renaissance Art at the Imperial Court of India, Vol. 2, 1998 Stanley K. Abe, A Freer Stela Reconsidered, Vol. 3, 2002 NEW SERIES Elizabeth West FitzHugh, John Winter, and Marco Leona, Studies Using Scientific Methods: Pigments in Later Japanese Paintings, Vol. 1, 2003 JAMES MCNEILL WHISTLER IN CONTEXT ESSAYS FROM THE WHISTLER CENTENARY SYMPOSIUM UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW, 2003 Edited by Lee Glazer, Margaret F. MacDonald, Linda Merrill, and Nigel Thorp FREER GALLERY OF ART OCCASIONAL PAPERS SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION WASHINGTON, D.C. NEW SERIES, VOL. 2 N r EDI'lORIAL BOARD Ann C. Gunter, series editor Louise Allison Cort Paul lett lulian Raby © 2008 Smithsonian Institution All rights reserved SERIES EDITOR Ann C. Gunter EDI TOR Alison EfFeny DESlCNER Marty Ittner Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Whistler Centenary Symposium (2003 : University of Glasgow) James McNeill Whistler in context : essays from the Whistler Centenary Symposium, Uni- versity of Glasgow, 2003 / edited by Lee Glazer ... [et al.]. -- 1st ed. -- p. cm. (Freer Gallery of Art occasional papers ; new ser, v. 2) includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-934686-09-9 (alk. paper) 1. Whistler, lames McNeill, 1 834- 1903-Congresses. I. Glazer, Lee. II. Freer Gallery of Art III. Title. N6537.W4W46 2003 760.092-dc22 2008013370 Robert Slitkin's essay first publishecl, in expanded form, as "lames Whistler as the Invisible Man: Anti-Aestheticism and Artistic Vision," Oxford Art Journal 29, no. 1 (March 2006), pp,53-75. NO I E All works illustrated are by James McNeill Whistler unless otherv^fise noted. Spelling and punctuation in letters to and from Whistler follow wherever possible that given in the online edition ot his correspondence published by the University ot Glasgow, www.whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk/corresepondence ^ 3 Smithsonian Freer Gallery ofArt CONTENTS Preface Iiiliaii Raby, Director, Freer Gallery of Art I Arthur M. Stickler Gallery Introduction Nigel Tliorp, University of Glasgow I. WHISTLER AT WORK: STYLE AND SUBJECTS 1 What is a Whistler? Margaret F. MacDonald, University of Glasgow 2 Points of Context and Contact: Framing Whistler's Nudes Monica Kjelhnan-Chapin, Emporia State University U. WHISTLER AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES 3 Apostles of the New Gospel: Whistler and Rossetti Joanna Meacock, University of Glasgow 4 Whistler and Monet: Impressionism and Britain Katharine Lochnan, Art Gallery of Ontario 5 Whistler as Model: The Enacted Biographies of Pictorialist Photographers Lilly Koltun, Portrait Gallery of Canada III. WHISTLER IN AN INTERNATIONAL CONTEXT 6 Whistler's French Critics Joy Newton, University of Glasgow 7 Whistler's Japanese Connections Ayako Ono, Sliinshu University COLOR PLATES 105 8 Whistler and German Histories of Modern Painting: 117 Another Case of Art and Art Critics Grischka Petri, University of Bonn and University of Glasgow IV. WRITING ABOUT WHISTLER 9 Making Enemies: Whistler, the Manifesto, and Reactionary Modernism 141 Julian Hanna, University ofBritisli Columbia 10 Butterfly Money: James McNeill Whistler as the Invisible Man 159 Robert Slifkin, Reed College 1 1 Getting Right with Whistler: An Artist and His Biographers 169 Daniel E. Sutherland, University ofArkansas V, WHISTLER'S CORRESPONDENCE 12 Creative Connection: James McNeill Whistler 183 and Isabella Stewart Gardner Linda J. Doclierty, Bowdoin College 13 Ambition, Hopes, and Disappointments: 205 The Relationship of Whistler and His Mother as Seen in Tlieir Correspondence Georgia Toutziari, Independent Scholar Abbreviations and Frequently Cited Sources 217 Authors and Editors 219 Index 223 Preface The new series of the Freer Gallery of Art Occasional Papers began in 2003, with Studies Using Scientific Methods: Pigments in Later Japanese Paintings by Elizabeth West Fitzhugh, John Winter, and Marco Leona. As was true of the original series, which was inaugurated in 1947 under Archibald G. Wenley, director of the museum, this iteration of the Occasional Papers is intended to appeal primarily to specialist readers and to include a wide range of subject matter, methodologies, and formats. This, the second volume in the series, moves from the realm of conservation sci- ence into art-historical inquiry, focusing on the American expatriate James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903). When the Freer Gallery of Art opened in 1923 as the first art museum in the Smithsonian Institution, it was largely the result of the mutual esteem and genuine friendship that had developed between Whistler and Charles Lang Freer, the American businessman and collector, who first introduced himself to the artist in an unannounced visit to his London studio in 1890. The relation- ship flourished, and in addition to aiding Freer in amassing what the artist called "a fine collection of Whistlers!! — perhaps Tlie collection," Whistler also inspireci Freer to visit Asia, where, he explained. Freer would find artistic treasures — early chapters in what he called "the story of the beautiful" — from which his own art was descended. Eventually Freer's collection and the museum that he founded would become primarily focused on the arts of Asia. Even so. Whistler's work is still a sig- nificant presence in our galleries and his aesthetic philosophy permeates the entire museum. The Whistler collection at the Freer Gallery includes 130 paintings, 174 drawings, and 946 prints, and our archival materials range from press clippings and photographs to a significant body of correspondence between Whistler and Freer, first published by the Freer Gallery of Art and now part of the complete correspon- dence published online by the University of Glasgow. This volume represents another collaborative effort between these two institu- tions. Tlie essays published here were first presented at the University of Glasgow in 2003, at a symposium occasioned by the centenary of the artists death. Together, Glasgow and the Freer Gallery of Art hold the foremost collections of work by James McNeill Whistler and have worked together for many years with the common aim of furthering research on Whistlers art and its historical significance. Nigel Thorp, who was director of the University's Centre for Whistler Studies at the time of the centenary, is owed a large debt of gratitude for his unstinting devotion to promoting new scholarship and for encouraging Lee Glazer, the current curator of American art at the Freer and Sackler Galleries, to bring this long awaited volume to completion. i The collective wealth of our artistic and scholarly resources will doubtless inspire many more opportunities to enjoy Whistler's aesthetic vision and explore the com- plexity of his cultural contexts. This volume was funded by a publications endowment established with a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and by a generous donation from the Lunder Foundation. Julian Raby Director ii Introduction Nigel Tlwrp I In April 1903 the University of Glasgow conferred on James Whistler the honor- ary degree of Doctor of Laws, in recognition of his lifetime of outstanding artistic achievement. Whistler was then in failing health and was unable to accept the de- gree in person, but he was delighted at the honor, and in his letter of acceptance he drew attention to the Scottish ancestry that he claimed through his mother's family of McNeill. His connections with the city itself had begun as early as 1849, when, following his father's early death in Russia, the surviving Whistler family visited relatives and friends in England and Scotland before returning to live in the United States. Years later, in 1891, his portrait of Thomas Carlyle, Arrangement in Grey and Black, No. 2 (see fig. 10.2), became the first of his paintings to enter a public col- lection when it was bought by the Corporation of Glasgow.