Titles

• 'Note in flesh-colour gold – The Golden Blossom' (1886, Dowdeswell's). 1
• 'Gold and Pink' (1889, Wunderlich's). 2
• 'Note in flesh-colour gold – The Golden Blossom' (1995, MacDonald). 3

In this catalogue raisonné Whistler's title or the first published title is retained, wherever possible. Whistler’s use of 'flesh-colour' to describe colour, as here, could imply a racist presumption that skin tone is defined as 'white' or Caucasian. In this case it presumably means the pale white, cream and pink of the model's skin, with the word 'gold' to add emotive and economic values. Wunderlich's, however, reduced the elaborate title to a simple 'Gold and Pink'.

Description

A nude woman stands in three-quarter view to left, her left leg slightly bent. She is holding (not very securely) a white pot with a light red trim, from which a young shrub is growing, bearing a few pale greeny lemon leaves or blossom. Her hair is bound in a scarf or ribbons of similar yellow. The drawing is in vertical format.

Sitter

Not identified.