The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Square Canister with expanding neck dates from 1876/1878.

It is a preliminary study for an illustration in a catalogue of the collection of Henry Thompson (1820-1894), published in 1878. ¹

Square Canister with expanding neck, Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute

It is fully catalogued in MacDonald 1995 (cat. rais.) [more] (cat. no. 625).

Images

Subject

Description

Square Canister with expanding neck, Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute

A sketch of a square canister.

The Thompson catalogue described the subject as follows:

'Square Canister with expanding neck. On one panel a sage seated on a rock, below which is a stag; on another panel two mandarins or persons of rank giving instructions to a warrior; on a third a rocky landscape with two figures carrying baskets; on the remaining one female figure, probably a goddess, appearing to a man who is leading an ox over a bridge; numerous birds flying round the bridge. On the neck lotus flowers and symbols. Height, 11 ½ inches.' ²

The side on the left apparently depicts the'two mandarins' and the one to right, two figures in a landscape, but no details are clear.

Technique

Composition

Square Canister with expanding neck, Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute

Square Canister with expanding neck, Freer Gallery of Art

This is a preliminary study for Square Canister with expanding neck m0626.

History

Provenance

• 1876/1878: given to Murray Marks (1840-1918), London art dealer;
• 1879: 29 preliminary drawings, 'sketches of blue and white vases, in the collection of Sir H. Thompson' were sold at auction, London, Christie, 7 February 1879 (lot 534) and bought by Pickford Robert Waller (1849-1930) for 1 guinea;
• 1930: bequeathed to his daughter Sybil Christina Waller (1882-1973);
• 1965: 29 drawings were sold at Christie's, London, 12 November 1965 (lot 32A), bought by Julius H. Weitzner (1896-1986), London dealer; ³
• 1969: sold by Knoedler's, New York dealers, to the Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute on 19 May 1969.

Exhibitions

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

Bibliography

Catalogues Raisonnés

• MacDonald, Margaret F., James McNeill Whistler. Drawings, Pastels and Watercolours. A Catalogue Raisonné, New Haven and London, 1995 (cat. no. 625) as 'Square Canister with expanding neck'.

Authored by Whistler

• Thompson, Sir Henry, A Catalogue of Blue and White Nankin Porcelain Forming the Collection of Sir Henry Thompson. Illustrated ... from Drawings by James Whistler ... and Sir Henry Thompson, London, 1878, final design (cat. no. 242) repr. pl. XIV.

Catalogues 1855-1905

EXHIBITION:

SALE:

• 29 preliminary drawings, 'sketches of blue and white vases, in the collection of Sir H. Thompson' were sold at auction, Christie's, London, 7 February 1879 (lot 534).