Detail from The Canal, Amsterdam, 1889, James McNeill Whistler, The Hunterian, University of Glasgow

 

M.1562
r.: Butterfly 'Encountered'; v.: Butterfly

Artist: James McNeill Whistler
Date: 1899
Collection: Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number: 1933.288
Medium: r.: pen and black ink over pencil; v.: pencil
Support: cream wove card
Size: 6 1/8 x 4 3/4" (155 x 121 mm)
Signature: butterfly
Inscription: r.: 'top./ "Encountered" ' and sideways 'size from highest point of tail to bottom of lowest foot.' Collector's mark of 'WSB' ( Walter Stanton Brewster); v.: in unknown hands '33.285/oc 4123'

r.: Butterfly 'Encountered'; v.: Butterfly

Catalogues Raisonnés

  • MacDonald, Margaret F., James McNeill Whistler. Drawings, Pastels and Watercolours. A Catalogue Raisonné, New Haven and London, 1995 (cat. no. 1562) as 'r.: Butterfly 'Encountered'; v.: Butterfly'.

Authored by Whistler

  • Whistler, James McNeill, Eden versus Whistler: The Baronet and the Butterfly. A Valentine with a Verdict, Paris: Louis-Henry May, 1899, p. xxiii.

Websites

  • Clarke, Jay A., and Sarah Kelly Oehler, eds., Whistler Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago, 2020, website (cat. no. 43).
  • 'Cats. 40–47 Butterflies and Club: Tombstone,' in Whistler Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago (The Art Institute of Chicago, 2020) URL (cat. no. 43) as 'Butterfly “Encountered” (recto); Sketch for Tailpiece (verso)'.

Last updated: 11th December 2020 by Margaret