Provenance

• 1903: sold by Whistler to Richard Albert Canfield (1855-1914) on 8 May 1903:
• 1914: bought by Knoedler's, New York art dealers, 12 March 1914, and sold to 'George F. Baker', who was probably George Fisher Baker (1840-1931), New York;
• 1931: bequeathed to his son George Fisher Baker jr (1878–1937);
• 1937: bequeathed to his wife, Edith Brevoort Kane Baker (1884-1977), Locust Vallery, New York;
• 1977: sold at auction, Parke-Bernet, New York, 28 October 1977 (lot 259, repr.) and bought by Hirschl and Adler, New York art dealers;
• After 1977: sold through Agnew's, London art dealers, to a private collector.

Further details are given in MacDonald 1995 (cat. rais.) [more] (cat. no. 1278). This history has been corrected.

Exhibitions

• 1904: Oil Paintings, Water Colors, Pastels and Drawings: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of Mr. J. McNeill Whistler, Copley Society, Boston, 1904 (cat. no. 125) as 'Blue and Violet "Iris" '.
• 1905: Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 145) as 'Bleu et violet. Iris'.