The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach dates from the mid-1870s, and may have been completed for exhibition in 1872 or 1875. ¹

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, Freer Gallery of Art

It may have been touched up and partly repainted in 1887 and 1892.

Images

Subject

Titles

Several possible titles have been suggested:

• Possibly 'Nocturne, in Blue and Silver' (1872, Dudley). ²
• Possibly 'Nocturne in blue and gold' (1875, Royal Pavilion Gallery, Brighton). ³
• Possibly 'Nocturne in Blue and Gold. No. 3' (1870s, Whistler). ⁴
• Possibly 'Nocturne in Blue and Gold' (1878,Grosvenor Gallery). ⁵
• 'Nocturne. Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach' (1892, Goupil). ⁶
• 'Nocturne. Bleu et argent. Battersea. – (Nocturne. Blue and Silver. Battersea Beach. [sic])' (1905, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts). ⁷

There was originally a label on the frame in Whistler's hand that read 'Nocturne in Blue and Gold. No. 3.' ⁸ This, confusingly, is the title under which Nocturne: Grey and Gold - Westminster Bridge y145 was exhibited in 1875. It is possible that the frames could have been switched, although Nocturne: Blue and Silver - Battersea Reach y119 is about 10 cm wider.

The possible changes of title make identifying the early exhibitions of this painting very hard to identify.

'Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach' is the accepted title, based on the 1892 Goupil title, with punctuation amended to conform with other titles.

Description

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, Freer Gallery of Art

A night scene, in horizontal format. The viewer is looking across the river to warehouses and factories on the south bank of the Thames. Sailing barges with furled sails are moored at a jetty in the foreground at right.

Site

A similar view of the Battersea shore of the river Thames seen from Chelsea as in Nocturne: Battersea y120.

Battersea Reach, looking across the Thames, Thomas Colville Fine Arts

The pen drawing, Battersea Reach, looking across the Thames, reproduced above, shows a similar view and may date from the same period.

A pastel, The Thames m0473, shows an almost identical view, and may have been a study for this painting. It is however in much brighter key colours than the oil.

The sailing barges are probably unloading coal and other goods at the jetty – possibly the Greaves' boatyard – below Whistler's Lindsey Row house in Chelsea, on the north shore of the Thames. The industrial buildings and chimneys of Battersea are seen on the south side of the river.

Technique

Composition

Battersea Reach, looking across the Thames, Thomas Colville Fine Arts

The vivid pen drawing, Battersea Reach, looking across the Thames, reproduced above, shows a similar view, and may have been a study for the oil or the pastel, The Thames m0473, reproduced below.

The Thames, pastel, Indiana University Art Museum

The vividly coloured pastel shows the same view and a similar foreground of shipping. It may have been based on the oil, rather than being a study for it.

Technique

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, Freer Gallery of Art

1870: The coarse canvas was originally under-painted in brown, before the surface was covered thinly with a complimentary shade of blue. According to Thomas Armstrong (1832-1911), John Chandler Bancroft (1835-1901) saw it 'prepared with what he called a chocolate brown':

'it had to be repainted in consequence of the surface having decayed. The result, though not durable, was most successful in quality of colour. This method of under-painting with what would be called a complementary colour was written about by one Hundutpfund.' ⁹

Art of painting restored to its simplest and surest principles, by Liberat Hundutpfund (1806-1878), was published in London in 1849 in translation from the German. It is quite possible that the book was known to Whistler, either directly or though a fellow-artist.

There are pentimenti on some of the horizon features (the slag heap, tower and chimneys) and on the boats and jetty. The surface has been rubbed as part of the painting process, increasing the blurred softness of the already thin paint.

Armstrong described this painting as a 'dark blue sea piece' but it is now greyish-black in colour, except for the spots of lights and their reflections, painted carefully with a fine pointed brush in several colours from white to yellow and orange. ¹⁰

Conservation History

1878: The painting was varnished by Orazio Buggiani (b. ca 1818) and a new frame was supplied, possibly for exhibition in London at Westminster Hall on 25 November 1878 during the Whistler v. Ruskin trial. Whistler wrote to Mrs Rawlinson at that time:

'Signor Buggiani who brings the Nocturne, is an Italian gentleman whom I beg to present to you - he has varnished the Nocturne for me - and is greatly gifted in all understanding of pictures and their ways - Perhaps you will if convenient let him look at your collection and if you have any (Old Masters or Modern) that require cleaning, restoring or varnishing let me recommend Signor Buggiani.' ¹¹

1887: By December 1887 'patches' had appeared, and Whistler offered to give William George Rawlinson (1840-1928) as much as Charles Augustus Howell (1840?-1890) had given for it 'or paint a new one for a new price'; Rawlinson replied that he wanted 'another one like it', and, when he heard nothing from Whistler, he sent the painting to William Dyer & Sons, 'the renowned picture doctor' at 8 Orchard Street, from whom it came back, 'very beautiful again.' ¹²

1892: Whistler wrote under the entry for this painting in a copy of the 1892 Goupil Gallery exhibition catalogue, 'Richards ought to put right & then borrow for Munich.' ¹³

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, photograph, Goupil Album, 1892, GUL Whistler PH5/6/9

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, in Mir Iskusstva, 1903, repr. p. 64

Whistler may have worked on it again in 1892, or his picture restorer, Stephen Richards (1844-1900), may have put it 'right'. Photographs of it, reproduced in 1892 and 1903 (seen above), differ from the painting as it is today in that the three chimneys are barely discernible; the end of the jetty is more pointed; the reflections of the jetty and the large sail are slightly altered; and the sail immediately to the right of the large sail is complete, whereas it has now virtually disappeared. Whether these were changes made by Whistler or are the results of the deterioration or restoration of the work in later years is difficult to establish.

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, photograph, 1980

Photographs of the painting under different light conditions and exposures have resulted in varying effects: the image above, as reproduced in the 1980 catalogue raisonné, is far too light.

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, Freer Gallery of Art

Conservation records at the Freer Gallery of Art note that the varnish was removed and 'Considerable repaint' undertaken in 1921; it was relined, retouched, and resurfaced in 1922, surfaced again in 1933, cleaned and surfaced in 1951. It was vandalised, repaired, and re-varnished in 1954. Some retouching using zinc white (zinc oxide), conflicting with the original white lead matrix pigment in the sky, caused considerable deterioration by 1959, and it was again cleaned, re-stretched, filled and in-painted, and re-varnished. ¹⁴

Frame

• By 1877: original frame of unknown style.
• 1878: replaced with a new Flat Whistler frame with a painted seigaiha pattern.
• 1892: painted decoration removed.

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, Freer Gallery of Art

For some reason Whistler had to replace the original frame with a new one for the owners, and, in the late autumn of 1878, Whistler wrote to Mrs Rawlinson saying, ‘My trial with Ruskin makes me very busy just now but I shall come soon to call - and also to bring another frame - painted - don’t let this one be touched please - I will explain.' ¹⁵ What happened to the initial frame that required Whistler to replace it remains unknown. It is possible that a well-intentioned painting restorer cleaned the frame, since in the same letter, Whistler discussed the cleaning and varnishing the painting had received from the picture restorer, Orazio Buggiani (b. ca 1818). Whatever the circumstance, this reframing did not result from a change in ownership.

Whistler decorated the frame that surrounds Nocturne: Blue and Silver - Battersea Reach y119 with a painted seigaiha pattern. It was shown at the Westminster Palace exhibition in November 1878 in the painted frame. Then the painted decoration was removed and the frame regilded for Whistler's 1892 Goupil retrospective exhibition.

History

Provenance

• ca 1877: sold to William George Rawlinson (1840-1928), Camden Hill, London;
• 1902: sold by Rawlinson through William Marchant & Co., London, to Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919), Detroit, in April 1902 for £2000, plus £200 commission;
• 1919: bequeathed by C. L. Freer to the Freer Gallery of Art.

There are two marginally different versions of the early provenance. The painting was sold to Rawlinson, possibly in 1877, for £100 or 100 guineas (£110). ¹⁶

However, an alternative provenance can be suggested: on 22 February 1878 Charles Augustus Howell (1840?-1890) bought five paintings from Whistler for £50, Girl with Cherry Blossom y090, Study for the Head of Miss Cicely H. Alexander y128, Nocturne: Grey and Gold - Chelsea Snow y174, Sketch for a Portrait of Henry Greaves y198, and 'a small framed Nocturne, Battersea', which was probably Nocturne y114 or the painting under discussion. ¹⁷

The later provenance is clear. In March 1902 Whistler told C. L. Freer, 'It pleases me immensely that you should have the Rawlinson Nocturne - Another canvas out of England! - and with its fellows, in your sympathetic care'. ¹⁸

Exhibitions

• 1872: Possibly 6th Winter Exhibition of Cabinet Pictures in Oil, Dudley Gallery, London, 1872 (cat. no. 237) as 'Nocturne, in Blue and Silver'. ¹⁹
• 1875: Possibly Second Annual Exhibition of Modern Pictures in Oil and Water Colour, Royal Pavilion Gallery, Brighton, 1875 (cat. no. 98) as 'Nocturne in blue and gold', priced at £420. ²⁰
• 1878: Possibly II Summer Exhibition, Grosvenor Gallery, London, 1878 (cat. no. 56) as 'Nocturne in Blue and Gold'.
• 1892: Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces, Goupil Gallery, London, 1892 (cat. no. 17) as 'Nocturne. Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'.
• 1899: Spring Exhibition of pictures, and objects of Art, Goupil Gallery, London, 1899 (cat. no. 31).
• Comparative exhibition of native and foreign art, Society of Art Collectors, New York, 1904 (cat. no. 177) as 'Nocturne – Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'.
• 1904: Oil Paintings, Water Colors, Pastels and Drawings: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of Mr. J. McNeill Whistler, Copley Society, Boston, 1904 (cat. no. 63) as 'Nocturne – Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'.
• 1905: Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 70) as 'Nocturne. Bleu et argent. Battersea. – (Nocturne. Blue and Silver. Battersea Beach. [sic])'.

The early exhibition history is uncertain.

This painting may have been the 'Nocturne, in Blue and Silver' exhibited at the Dudley Gallery in 1872 (see Nocturne in Blue and Silver y118). The major problem is that reviews of the show are very vague indeed and do not allow a conclusive identification: The Illustrated London News described the exhibited work only as 'the Thames at Battersea'. ²¹ The Echo stated that: 'One or two broad sweeps of monotint cover the canvas from end to end, certain small streaks of light and dark paint being touched on here and there,' and added that the frame was signed with a butterfly. ²²

Three years later, either this painting, Nocturne: Blue and Silver - Cremorne Lights y115, or Nocturne in Blue and Gold y141 could have been the 'Nocturne in blue and gold' exhibited in Brighton in 1875 and priced at £420.0.0. ²³ Furthermore, in 1878, it is possible that it was again a 'Nocturne in Blue and Gold' on show at the Grosvenor Gallery, which was described in the Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer:

' "Nocturne in Blue and Gold" is evidently the entrance to a harbour; there can be very little doubt of the fact, as there is a distinct suggestion of lights on a sort of pier or wharf, and one sail which sticks up in a dejected sort of way shows conclusively that the artist is treating a river or sea scene.' ²⁴

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, Freer Gallery of Art

Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach, photograph, Goupil Album, 1892, GUL Whistler PH5/6/9

It was definitely exhibited in Whistler's retrospective at the Goupil Gallery in 1892 as 'Nocturne. Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'. For the catalogue, designed by Whistler, he selected a dismissive quotation (said to be from the Scotsman) to comment, ironically, on this painting: 'J. M. Whistler is here again with his nocturnes.' ²⁵

A few years later, in 1899, it was again shown at Goupil's, and received remarkably enthusiastically in the press, being described as 'beautiful and celebrated' in the St James's Gazette on 17 March and as 'a painted poem', in the The Queen on 1 April. ²⁶

After Whistler's death, it was lent by Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919) to a loan show at the Society of Art Collectors in New York in 1904, and to two of the Whistler Memorial exhibitions, to Boston in 1904 and Paris in the following year.

By the terms of C. L. Freer's bequest to the Freer Gallery of Art, the painting cannot be lent to another venue.

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. 119), plate 75, as 'Nocturne: Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'.

Authored by Whistler

• Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces, Goupil Gallery, London, 1892 (cat. no. 17).
• Goupil Gallery and James McNeill Whistler, Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces [portfolio of photographs published after the Goupil Gallery Exhibition, March-April 1892], London, 1892, repr. pl. 15.

Catalogues 1855-1905

• Possibly 6th Winter Exhibition of Cabinet Pictures in Oil, Dudley Gallery, London, 1872 (cat. no. 237) as 'Nocturne, in Blue and Silver'.
• Possibly Second Annual Exhibition of Modern Pictures in Oil and Water Colour, Royal Pavilion Gallery, Brighton, 1875 (cat. no. 98) as 'Nocturne in blue and gold', priced at £420.
• Possibly II Summer Exhibition, Grosvenor Gallery, London, 1878 (cat. no. 56) as 'Nocturne in Blue and Gold'.
• Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces, Goupil Gallery, London, 1892 (cat. no. 17) as 'Nocturne. Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'.
• Spring Exhibition of pictures, and objects of Art, Goupil Gallery, London, 1899 (cat. no. 31).
• Comparative exhibition of native and foreign art, Society of Art Collectors, New York, 1904 (cat. no. 177) as 'Nocturne – Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'.
• Oil Paintings, Water Colors, Pastels and Drawings: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of Mr. J. McNeill Whistler, Copley Society, Boston, 1904 (cat. no. 63) as 'Nocturne – Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'.
• 1905: Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 70) as 'Nocturne. Bleu et argent. Battersea. – (Nocturne. Blue and Silver. Battersea Beach. [sic])'.

Newspapers 1855-1905

• Anon., 'The Dudley Gallery', Globe, London, 25 October 1872, p. 4.
• Anon., 'The Dudley Gallery', The Echo, 26 October 1872, p. 2.
• Anon., 'Fine Arts: Winter Exhibition at the Dudley Gallery', The Illustrated London News, London, 2 November 1872, p. 419.
• Anon., 'The Grosvenor Gallery,' Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer, Leeds, 14 May 1878, p. 6.
• Anon., 'The Goupil Gallery', Morning Post, London, 10 March 1899, p. 7.
• Anon., 'Art Exhibitions', Daily Telegraph and Courier, London, 14 March 1899, p. 5.
• Anon., 'The Goupil Gallery', St James's Gazette, London, 17 March 1899, pp. 4-5.
• Anon., 'Pictures at the Goupil Gallery', The Queen, London, 1 April 1899, pp. 21-22.

Journals 1855-1905

• MacColl, Dugald Sutherland, 'Mr Whistler’s Paintings in Oil', The Art Journal, 1893, pp. 88-93, repr. p. 91.
• Alexandre, Arsène, 'J. McNeill Whistler', Les Arts, October 1903, pp. 22-32, repr. p. 30.
• Matsuki, Bunkio (ed.), 'Whistler Memorial Exhibition', Lotus, vol. 1, no. 1, (Special Holiday Number in Memoriam: James A. McNeill Whistler), December 1903, pp. 7-9, at p. 9.
• Anon., ‘Дж. УистлерЪ [Dzh. Uistler]’, Мир искусства [Mir Iskusstva, 'World of Art'], vol. 9, 1903, pp. 61-68, repr. p. 64.
• Comparative Exhibition of Native and Foreign Art, Society of Art Collectors, The American Fine Arts Society, New York, 1904 (cat. no. 177) 'Nocturne – Blue and Silver – Battersea Reach'.

Monographs

• None.

Books on Whistler

• Cary, Elizabeth Luther, The Works of James McNeill Whistler: A Study, with a Tentative List of Artist’s Works, New York, 1907, p. 166 (cat. no. 63).
• Hartmann, Sadakichi C. (pseudonym of Sidney Allen), The Whistler Book: A Monograph of the Life and Position in Art of James McNeill Whistler, Together with a Careful Study of His More Important Works, Boston, 1910, p. 265.
• Holden, Donald, Whistler Landscapes and Seascapes, New York, 1969, p. 37, pl. 8.
• Lawton, Thomas, Freer: a Legacy of Art, Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, 1993, p. 36.
• Merrill, Linda, With Kindest Regards. The Correspondence of Charles Lang Freer and James McNeill Whistler, 1890-1903, Washington, DC, and London, 1995, pp. 64, 214, repr. pl. 16.
• Pennell, Elizabeth Robins, and Joseph Pennell, The Life of James McNeill Whistler, 2 vols, London and Philadelphia, 1908, vol. 1, p. 214.
• Sickert, Bernhard, Whistler, London and New York, 1908, p. 162 (cat. no. 80).
• Spencer, Robin, Whistler, New York, 1990, p. 144.
• Taylor, Hilary, James McNeill Whistler, London, 1978, pl. 51.

Books, General

• Lamont, L. M., (ed.), Thomas Armstrong, C. B.: A Memoir, London, 1912, p. 200.

Catalogues 1906-Present

COLLECTION:

• Stubbs, Burns A., Paintings, Pastels, Drawings, Prints and Copper Plates by and attributed to American and European Artists, together with a List of Original Whistleriana in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 1948, p. 15 (02.97).
• Curry, David Park, James McNeill Whistler at the Freer Gallery of Art, New York and London, 1984, pp. 122, 293, pl. 25.

EXHIBITION:

• 75th Annual Exhibition, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, 1906 (cat. no. 446) as 'Nocturne: Blue and Silver, Battersea Reach'.
• Paintings in oil and pastel by James McNeill Whistler, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1910 (cat. no. 16).
• Selection of Art Objects from The Freer Collection, National Museum, Washington, DC, 1912 (cat. no. 24).
• MacDonald, Margaret, and Patricia de Montfort, An American in London: Whistler and the Thames, Dulwich Picture Gallery, Addison Gallery of American Art, Freer Gallery of Art, 2013-2014 (cat. no. 64) shown in Washington only.

Journals 1906-Present

Websites

• Freer Gallery of Art website at https://asia.si.edu/object/F1902.97a-b.

Unpublished

• Revillon, Joseph Whistler, Draft Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of J. McN. Whistler, [ca 1945-1955], Glasgow University Library (cat. no. 67) 'Nocturne, blue and silver: Battersea Reach'.

Other

• None.