Provenance

• 1898: sold by the artist to George Washington Vanderbilt (1862-1914), Asheville, North Carolina, but retained by the artist;
• 1903: in Whistler's studio at his death;
• 1904: sent by the artist's executrix, Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958), to the sitter;
• 1914: bequeathed to Vanderbilt's widow, Edith Stuyvesant Vanderbilt (1873-1958), later Mrs. Peter G. Gerry, Asheville, North Carolina, and Providence, Rhode Island;
• 1959: after her death, given to the National Gallery of Art.

It was commissioned by the sitter in May 1897. 1 Vanderbilt sent the final cheque on 25 August 1898. 2 The portrait was in Whistler's studio at his death in 1903 and passed into the keeping of his ward and executrix, Miss R. Birnie Philip, who showed it to Vanderbilt and his wife in January 1904. 3 It was then delivered to Vanderbilt.

Exhibitions

• 1905: Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 22) as 'Inachevé – (Le dernier portrait en pied que Whistler ait peint)'.

It was not exhibited in Whistler's lifetime.