The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Chambre à la ferme de Maladrie dates from August 1858. It is a study for the drypoint The Miser [17].

Chambre à la ferme de Maladrie, Freer Gallery fo Art

It is fully catalogued in MacDonald 1995 (cat. rais.) [more] (cat. no. 229).

Images

Subject

Site

A farm in or near Maladrie, a small country town in the province of Namur, Belgium. On another page from his sketchbook Whistler drew his companion, Ernest Delannoy (d. 1869/1872), sleeping on a bench at the end of a bed, and this was similarly inscribed, A la ferme de Maladrie m0230. The two artists probably slept and ate at farms along their route; this could be the farmhouse kitchen, where labourers ate at the long table.

Technique

Composition

Chambre à la ferme de Maladrie, Freer Gallery of Art

The Miser, Freer Gallery of Art

Chambre à la ferme de Maladrie is a study for the drypoint The Miser [17].

Technique

Over fifty drawings, many in sketchbooks, most of which dated from 1857-1858, were apparently given to Whistler's half-sister Deborah and/or her husband, Francis Seymour Haden, and were later removed from the sketchbooks.

History

Provenance

• 1858: probably given to Deborah Delano Haden (1825-1908) or her husband Francis Seymour Haden, Sr (1818-1910);
• 1898: sold through Wunderlich, New York dealers, to Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919);
• 1919: bequeathed by C. L. Freer to the Freer Gallery of Art.

See further details in r.: Les Côtes à Dieppe; v.: Cliffs and building m0222.

Exhibitions

It was not, as far as is known, exhibited in Whistler's lifetime.

Due to the terms of Freer's will, it cannot be lent to another venue.

Bibliography

Catalogues Raisonnés

• MacDonald, Margaret F., James McNeill Whistler. Drawings, Pastels and Watercolours. A Catalogue Raisonné, New Haven and London, 1995 (cat. no. 229) as 'Chambre à la ferme de Maladrie'.

Catalogues 1906-Present

• Curry, David Park, James McNeill Whistler at the Freer Gallery of Art, New York and London, 1984, p. 217, pl. 163.

Websites

• Freer Gallery of Art website at https://asia.si.edu/object/F1898.15, as 'Chambre à la Ferme de Maladrie'.
• Margaret F. MacDonald, Grischka Petri, Meg Hausberg, and Joanna Meacock, James McNeill Whistler: The Etchings, a catalogue raisonné, University of Glasgow, 2012 (cat. no. 17) website at http://etchings.arts.gla.ac.uk.