Description

Whistler's accompanying letter describes the table palette as follows:

'You must send for Grau and tell him to make at once, a palette exactly like mine - the same size, etc. - - with the little boxes all round for the paints - you know. - finish it at once - pack it up and send it to

Monsieur de La Gandara 22. / Rue Monsieur le Prince / Paris.'

I cannot tell you how courteous and kind he has been - nor can I exagerate [sic] the unheard of trouble I have given him - Happily this present from me will be for him a joy beyond all past annoyances - and I am sure you will wish him to have it' 1

A photograph of Whistler at work on Portrait of Maud Franklin [YMSM 353], reproduced above, probably in 1886, shows him using a table palette.

In 1886 George Augustus Sala (1828-1895) had described Whistler's Fulham Road studio, where he used such a table palette, and George Percy Jacomb Hood (1857-1929) painted the palette loaded with paint and oil. 2

Robert de Montesquiou-Fezensac (1855-1921) described the palette as 'une vaste table d'acajou sur le coin de laquelle, en une minuscule plaque d'argent, voltige le butterfly'. 3