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

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M.1576
Butterfly design for 'L'Envoi'

Artist: James McNeill Whistler
Date: 1898
Collection: Whereabouts unknown
Accession Number: none
Medium: pencil, pen and dark brown ink
Support: off-white wove paper laid down
Size: 197 x 152 mm (7 3/4 x 6")
Signature: unsigned
Inscription: recto inscribed ‘For l’Envoie / Butterfly about same size as present trial one – quite as small – perhaps a little smaller’ ['quite' is underlined], and, in an unknown hand, ‘4 3/4 to 1 1/2 [arrow] 1’, ‘top’, ‘(5)’; verso inscribed in unknown hand ‘black [bing] PP / 2nd margin / Lay only [&] show [&] mgin / [2] and 10 / [Devonald/Deverald] / R’

Butterfly design for 'L'Envoi'

Catalogues Raisonnés

  • MacDonald, Margaret F., James McNeill Whistler. Drawings, Pastels and Watercolours. A Catalogue Raisonné, New Haven and London, 1995 (cat. no. 1576) as "Butterfly design for ‘L’Envoi’ ".

Authored by Whistler

  • Whistler, James McNeill, Eden versus Whistler: The Baronet and the Butterfly. A Valentine with a Verdict, Paris: Louis-Henry May, 1899, repr. p. 81.

Catalogues 1906-Present

  • MacDonald, Margaret F., Notes, Harmonies, and Nocturnes: Small Works by James McNeill Whistler, M. Knoedler and Co., New York, 1984 (cat. no. 7).
  • Dorment, Richard, and Margaret F. MacDonald (eds), James McNeill Whistler, Tate Gallery, London, Musée d’Orsay, Paris, and National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 1994-1995 (cat. no. 99), repr.

Last updated: 9th March 2021 by Margaret