The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Nocturne: Trafalgar Square – Snow dates from 1875/1876.

Nocturne: Trafalgar Square – Snow, Freer Gallery of Art

It was first shown at the Spring Exhibition at the Society of French Artists, which opened in February 1876.

Images

Subject

Titles

Several possible titles have been suggested:

• 'A Winter Fog' (1876, Society of French Artists). ¹
• 'Nocturne "Blue & Silver" Trafalgar Square Chelsea (Snow)' (1892, Whistler). ²
• 'Blue & Silver Chelsea Snow' (1892, D. C. Thomson). ³
• 'Nocturne / Trafalgar Square – Snow' (1892, Goupil). ⁴
• 'Gris et Or; – nocturne, Trafalgar Square Chelsea' (1892, Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts, Paris). ⁵
• 'Trafalgar Square, Chelsea – snow and twilight' (1893, Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts). ⁶
• 'Nocturne in Blue' (1901, Glasgow Art Galleries). ⁷
• 'Trafalgar Square, Chelsea' (1905, ISSPG). ⁸
• 'Nocturne: Trafalgar Square – Snow' (1980, YMSM). ⁹

The preferred title, 'Nocturne: Trafalgar Square – Snow', is based on the 1892 title, with punctuation regularised.

Description

Nocturne: Trafalgar Square – Snow, Freer Gallery of Art

A grey city-scape in horizontal format, showing the right hand corner of a square surrounded by three-storey buildings. There are bare branched trees in the square. In the foreground at left is the corner of a fence, with light shining on the snow behind it. There is a street lamp at right, and a glimpse, beyond the far right corner of the square, of buildings and a tower with lit windows. Lights shine faintly from buildings on the far side of the square, to left.

Site

The scene shows not the well-known Trafalgar Square but another Trafalgar Square, which was off the Fulham Road in Chelsea, London. Curry identified it as the north-west corner of the square, looking towards the New Brompton Road. ¹⁰

Comments

Musical connections were discussed in, for instance, on the former Freer Gallery of Art website, in Whistler and Music:

'This nocturne, depicting a snow-laden Trafalgar Square in Chelsea, was also in the 1892 exhibition of Whistler's work that Debussy is thought to have seen. Deeply influenced by Whistler's art and thought, Debussy once wrote about his orchestra Nocturnes (1897-99), "It's an experiment, in fact, in finding the different combinations possible inside a single color, as a painter might make a study in gray, for example." The composer's indebtedness to the visual arts is also reflected in the names he gave to many of his other works: images, sketches, estampes (prints), and scenes.' ¹¹

Technique

Technique

Nocturne: Trafalgar Square – Snow, Freer Gallery of Art

It is painted thinly and evenly on a broad weave canvas, which is roughly equivalent to the French 'toile de I2' (46 x 61 cm) in size. Areas have been rubbed to mute changes of tone, but the outlines of buildings were lightly clarified with long, fluid brushstrokes. The railings in the left foreground were painted with thin, creamy paint after the rest had dried.

Conservation History

According to the Freer Gallery files, yellowed varnish was removed in 1921, it was relined and resurfaced in 1925, cleaned and resurfaced in 1949, and revarnished in 1951.

Frame

1875/1878: the style and whereabouts of the original frame – possibly a painted, decorated frame – are unknown.

Nocturne: Trafalgar Square – Snow, Freer Gallery of Art

1892: Grau Whistler frame. Framed by Frederick Henry Grau (1859-1892) for Whistler's retrospective at Goupil's in 1892. The signature of 'F. H. Grau, London' is on the verso.

History

Provenance

• 1876/1878: sold or given to the artist Albert Joseph Moore (1841-1893), London;
• 1892: sold by Moore through Whistler to Alexander Reid (1854-1928), Glasgow art dealer;
• 1892/1893: sold by Reid to Arthur Kay (1860-1939), Glasgow.
• By 1901: Dugald M'Corkindale (d. 1903), M.D., Glasgow;
• 1901/1902: sold by Théodore Duret (1838-1927), Paris, through Agnew, London dealers, to J. W. Martin White (dates unknown), 19 April 1902;
• 1908: bought from White by Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919), Detroit, August I908 for £1900;
• 1919: bequeathed by C. L. Freer to the Freer Gallery of Art.

It is not known when Whistler gave this to Moore, but they were friends from the mid-1860s: it is most likely that it was given to him around the time of Whistler's bankruptcy in 1879. On 25 November 1892 Alexander Reid, having offered Albert Moore £80 for it, wrote to Whistler stating that he was negotiating its purchase after seeing it in Whistler's studio, so Whistler sent it to Reid in Glasgow; Moore was annoyed because a price was not settled, and eventually Reid paid £90 for it. ¹²

The Glasgow art critic, collector and dealer, Arthur Kay, lent it to an exhibition in 1893 and may have sold it to Dugal M'Corkindale, who lent it to the Glasgow International Exhibition in 1901. Within a year it was sold again. According to dealers' records, it was sold by Duret (though this seems a little odd) through Messrs Agnew (a/c #404) to J. W. Martin White on 19 April 1902, and by White to C. L. Freer, in August I908 for £1900.

Exhibitions

• 1876: 12th Exhibition, Society of French Artists, Deschamps Gallery, London, 1876 (cat. no. 140) as 'A Winter Fog'.
• 1892: Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces, Goupil Gallery, London, 1892 (cat. no. 6) as 'Nocturne / Trafalgar Square – Snow'.
• 1892: Exposition Nationale des Beaux-Arts, Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts, Champ-de-Mars, Paris, 1892 (cat. no. 1070) as ‘Gris et Or; – nocturne, Trafalgar square Chelsea’.
• 1893: 32nd Exhibition of Works of Modern Artists, Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts, Glasgow, 1893 (cat. no. 22) as 'Trafalgar Square, Chelsea – snow and twilight'.
• 1901: International Exhibition, Glasgow Art Galleries, Glasgow, 1901 (cat. no. 417) as 'Nocturne in Blue'.
• 1904: Exhibition catalogue Edinburgh 1904 [more] (cat. no. 255) as 'Trafalgar Square, Chelsea'.
• 1905: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of the late James McNeill Whistler, First President of The International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers, New Gallery, Regent Street, London, 1905 (cat. no. 33) as 'Trafalgar Square, Chelsea'.

This nocturne was first exhibited at the Society of French Artists in 1876, when the correspondent for the Glasgow Herald described it:

' "A Winter Fog" (140) will probably attract the most admiration, and most truly does it deserve all that can be said of it. The snow has been falling, and night has closed in, bringing with it fog and mist, through which, at the corner of the street, the glimmer of a warm, well-lighted room faintly struggles, whilst the looker's gaze seems to lose itself in the suggested murkiness of the street beyond.' ¹³

The critic writing for The Academy, probably William Michael Rossetti (1829-1919), described the painting in enough detail to identify it:

'Mr. Whistler has lately completed three interesting studies of landscape. One of these is a winter scene, and records an attempt to interpret the effect of snow at dusk when the white tones of the earth are caught and overpowered by the darkened mist that hangs in the air. As in all the artist's paintings of landscape, the constant realities of the chosen scene yield to the momentary influences under which the scene is viewed. The sombre tones of the earth reveal not the familiar qualities of snow, but the particular aerial conditions by which these are controlled and modified. And in the yellow and softly diffused light that glimmers from a window at the end of the little street, as well as in the heavy darkness of the sky above, and in the uncertain forms of houseroof or tree that stand against the sky, the spectator has so many more symbols by which to measure the density of the thick night air, and to realise its attributes of colour.' ¹⁴

During the time that Albert Moore owned the painting, it was not exhibited until the Goupil show in 1892. From there, it went directly to Goupil’s Paris branch for submission to the Salon. D. C. Thomson intended it to be reproduced in the Goupil Album in 1892 but some proofs were 'shockingly bad', complained Whistler. ¹⁵

The Ardrossan and Saltcoats Herald on 24 March 1893 described the painting as 'soft and delicate in colour, it makes a rather weird picture of a dim, deserted square.' ¹⁶ The Glasgow art critic, Arthur Kay (1860-1939), who owned this work briefly, kept press cuttings regarding the 1893 exhibition, some describing the painting as 'a morning effect' and 'One of Mr Whistler's studies in grey.' ¹⁷ Another critic called it 'A badly placed unnamed Whistler – an "arrangement in grey." ' ¹⁸ Percy Bate (1868-1913) praised the painting, 'A Nocturne in Blue' when it was shown in Glasgow in 1901:

'the dim mass of the houses that form two sides of the London square; the attenuated trees, ghostly in the moonlight; the exquisite indications of the evening haze of a town atmosphere; and the beautiful shivering blue of the sky, are all most charmingly rendered; and this work alone, small as it is, is one of the most notable landscape paintings in the gallery.' ¹⁹

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. 173), plate 93, as 'Nocturne: Trafalgar Square – Snow', and (cat. no. 161) as ‘A Winter Fog’.

Authored by Whistler

• Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces, Goupil Gallery, London, 1892 (cat. no. 6).

Catalogues 1855-1905

• 12th Exhibition, Society of French Artists, Deschamps Gallery, London, 1876 (cat. no. 140) as 'A Winter Fog'.
• [Whistler, James McNeill, and Goupil Gallery (eds)], Nocturnes, Marines & Chevalet Pieces: Small Collection Kindly Lent by Their Owners, London, 1892 (cat. no. 6) as 'Nocturne / Trafalgar Square – Snow'.
• Exposition nationale des Beaux-Arts: Catalogue Illustré des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture et gravure exposés au Champ-de-Mars, Paris, 1892 (cat. no. 1070) as ‘Gris et Or; – nocturne, Trafalgar square Chelsea’.
• 32nd Exhibition of Works of Modern Artists, Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts, Glasgow, 1893 (cat. no. 22) as 'Trafalgar Square, Chelsea – snow and twilight'.
• Glasgow International Exhibition, 1901: The Official Catalogue, Glasgow, 1901 (cat. no. 4I7) as 'Nocturne in Blue'.
• The Exhibition of the Royal Scottish Academy of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture, MCMIV. The Seventy-Eighth, Edinburgh, 1904 (cat. no. 255) as 'Trafalgar Square, Chelsea'.
• The International Society of Sculptors, Painters, and Gravers (ed.), Memorial Exhibition of the Works of the Late J. McNeill Whistler, London, 1905 (cat. no. 33) as 'Trafalgar Square, Chelsea'.

Newspapers 1855-1905

• Anon., 'Fine Art Exhibitions in London', The Glasgow Herald, Glasgow, 25 April 1876, p. 3.
• Anon., 'Pictures by French Artists', London Evening Standard, London, 18 May 1876, p. 2.
• Anon., 'Art and Artists', Globe, London, 2 March 1892, p. 6.
• A.U [Pennell, Elizabeth Robins], 'Whistler Pictures', The Star, 2 April 1892, p. 2.
• Anon., 'Picture Exhibitions in Scotland: Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts', The Glasgow Herald, Glasgow, 3 February 1893, p. 9.
• Anon., Evening Citizen, Glasgow, 2 February 1893.
• Anon., 'Glasgow Fine Art Institute: Press View - To-Day', Glasgow Evening News, Glasgow, 2 February 1893, p. 5.
• Anon., 'Pictures at the Art Institute', Ardrossan and Saltcoats Herald, Ardrossan, 24 March 1893, p. 5.

Journals 1855-1905

• Anon. [Rossetti, William Michael?], 'Notes and News', The Academy, 19 February 1876, p. 180.
• Bate, Percy, Art at the Glasgow Exhibition, Glasgow, 1901, p. 62.
• Sickert, Oswald, ‘The Oil Paintings of James McNeill Whistler’, The Studio, vol. 30, October 1903, pp. 3-10, repr. frontisp.

Monographs

• None.

Books on Whistler

• Curry, David Park, James McNeill Whistler: Uneasy Pieces, New York, 2004, p. 410 n.15.
• Holden, Donald, Whistler Landscapes and Seascapes, New York, 1969, p. 45, pl. 12.
• Pennell, Elizabeth Robins, and Joseph Pennell, The Life of James McNeill Whistler, 2 vols, London and Philadelphia, 1908, vol. 2, repr. p. 116.
• Pousette-Dart, Nathaniel, (ed.), James McNeill Whistler,(with introduction by Joseph & Elizabeth Robins Pennell), New York, 1924, repr. pl. 43.
• Sickert, Bernhard, Whistler, London and New York, 1908, no. 97, p. 164.

Books, General

• Bate, Percy, Art at the Glasgow Exhibition, Glasgow, 1901.
• Meier-Graefe, Julius, Modern Art, 2 vols., London and New York, 1908, repr. pl. 59.

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. 16 (08. 169).
• Curry, David Park, James McNeill Whistler at the Freer Gallery of Art, New York and London, 1984, pp. 125, 293, plate 29.

EXHIBITION:

• University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 1910 (cat. no. 75).
• Selection of Art Objects from The Freer Collection, National Museum, Washington, DC, 1912 (cat. no. 16).
• Inaugural Exhibition, Toledo Museum of Art, 1912 (cat. no. 107).
• Merrill, Linda, et al., After Whistler: The Artist and His Influence on American Painting, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, 2003, p. 71 (not exhibited).

Journals 1906-Present

• Sickert, Oswald, 'The oil paintings of James McNeill Whistler', International Studio, November 1903, vol. 21, no. 81, repr. frontisp; and Studio, London, 15 October 1903, vol. 30, no. 127, repr. frontisp.

Websites

• Freer Gallery of Art website at https://asia.si.edu/object/F1908.169a-b.

Unpublished

• Revillon, Joseph Whistler, Draft Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of J. McN. Whistler, [ca 1945-1955], Glasgow University Library (cat. no. 362).

Other

• Siewert, John, 'Whistler’s Nocturnes and the Aesthetic Subject', PhD thesis, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 1994.