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

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YMSM 190
Harmony in Yellow and Gold: The Gold Girl – Connie Gilchrist

Artist: James McNeill Whistler
Date: 1877/1879
Collection: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Accession Number: 11.32
Medium: oil
Support: canvas
Size: 217.8 x 109.5 cm (85 3/4 x 43 1/8")
Signature: butterfly
Inscription: 'CONNIE GILCHRIST'
Frame: Portrait Whistler, with Grau label, 1892 [17.1 cm]

Harmony in Yellow and Gold: The Gold Girl – Connie Gilchrist

Titles

Several possible titles have been suggested:

  • 'The Gold Girl: a harmony in Yellow & Gold.' (1878/1879, C. A. Howell).
  • 'Harmony in Yellow and Gold – The Gold Girl – Portrait of Miss Connie Gilchrist' (1879, Grosvenor). 1
  • 'The Gold Girl' (1879, London Bankruptcy Court). 2
  • 'Connie Gilchrist, dancing with a skipping rope, styled "A Girl in Gold" ' (1880, Sotheby's). 3
  • 'Harmony in Yellow and Gold: The Gold Girl – Connie Gilchrist' (1980, YMSM). 4

'Harmony in Yellow and Gold: The Gold Girl – Connie Gilchrist' is the preferred title.

Description

Harmony in Yellow and Gold: The Gold Girl – Connie Gilchrist, Metropolitan Museum of Art
Harmony in Yellow and Gold: The Gold Girl – Connie Gilchrist, Metropolitan Museum of Art

A figure composition in vertical format, showing a young girl dressed in a short tunic, with a skipping rope, skipping on stage in front of a curtain. She faces three-quarter right.

Sitter

Samuel Alex Walker, Connie Gilchrist, 1880, carte de visite, V&A S.135:398-2007
Samuel Alex Walker, Connie Gilchrist, 1880, carte de visite, V&A S.135:398-2007

Connie Gilchrist (1864-1946) . She also posed for The Blue Girl: Portrait of Connie Gilchrist [YMSM 207]. She was a professional dancer as well as a professional model, being paid for modelling. 5

Notes:

1: III Summer Exhibition, Grosvenor Gallery, London, 1879 (cat. no. 55).

2: 7 May 1879, London Bankruptcy Court to J. A. Rose, GUW #11711.

3: Sotheby's, London, 12 February 1880 (lot 87).

4: YMSM 1980 [more] (cat. no. 190).

5: Note by C. A. Howell, [1878/April 1879], GUW #02791.

Last updated: 21st May 2021 by Margaret