The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

The Fishwife dates from about 1855.

The Fishwife, Private collection

It was probably executed in America, but it could date from after November 1855 when Whistler arrived in Paris. ¹

Images

Subject

Titles

Only one title has been suggested:

• 'The Fishwife' (1980, YMSM). ²

Description

The Fishwife, Private collection

The head of an old woman smoking a clay pipe. Her face is flushed, she has grey hair under a yellow kerchief, and is wearing a red blouse. Her clay pipe is off-white. The background is dark brown. The portrait is an oval on a vertical, rectangular, piece of card.

Sitter

Not identified.

Technique

Composition

The Fishwife, Private collection

The Fishwife, Private collection

A pen drawing, The Fishwife m0212, about 130 mm diameter, is closely related to the oil.

La Mère Gérard (1), Colby College Museum of Art

The subject, and the treatment of the head, have clear links with several larger portraits: La Mère Gérard (1) y026, La Mère Gérard (2) y027 and Head of an Old Man Smoking y025.

Technique

Despite its small scale, the portrait is painted vigorously, with bright colours, and with very thick impasto, particularly on the face. It was painted in an ellipse within a rectangular card.

Conservation History

It was cleaned in 1950; it is very dark.

Frame

The Fishwife, Private collection

The Fishwife, photograph

It is framed as an oval.

History

Provenance

• ca 1855: probably acquired from the artist by Thomas de Kay Winans (1820-1878), Baltimore;
• 1878: bequeathed to his daughter Celeste Marguerite Winans (Mrs G. M. Hutton) (1855-1925), Baltimore, MD;
• 1916: bequeathed to her daughter, Elsie Celeste Winans, Mrs G. McR. Hutton (1884-1966), New York;
• 1965: bequeathed to Sybil Agnes Prichard, Mrs E. G. Walk (1915-2009) (Mrs Everett Walk), Reading, PA;
• 2009: private collection.

The New York Herald on 15 June 1878 reported that Thomas Winans had bequeathed his art collection to his daughter Celeste Marguerite Winans.

Exhibitions

It was not exhibited in Whistler's lifetime.

Bibliography

Catalogues Raisonnés

• Young, Andrew McLaren, Margaret F. MacDonald, Robin Spencer, and Hamish Miles, The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler, New Haven and London, 1980 (cat. no. 6), plate 4, as 'The Fishwife'.
• MacDonald, Margaret F., James McNeill Whistler. Drawings, Pastels and Watercolours. A Catalogue Raisonné, New Haven and London, 1995 (cat. no. 212).

Authored by Whistler

• None.

Catalogues 1855-1905

• None.

Journals 1855-1905

• None.

Monographs

• None.

Books on Whistler

• None.

Books, General

• None.

Catalogues 1906-Present

• None.

Journals 1906-Present

• Pressly, Nancy D., 'Whistler in America: An Album of Early Drawings', Metropolitan Museum Journal, New York, vol. 5, 1972, pp. 125-54, at p. 135.
• Sandberg, John, 'Whistler’s Early Work in America', Art Qurterly, vol. 29, 1967, pp. 46-58.

Websites

• None.

Unpublished

• Revillon, Joseph Whistler, Draft Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of J. McN. Whistler, [ca 1945-1955], Glasgow University Library (cat. no. 20) 'The Fishwife'.

Other

• None.