The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Shop Front dates from 1885. ¹

At some time in the summer of 1885 while Whistler was painting William Merritt Chase (1849-1916), they took a cab from what Chase called 'Whistler's studio in King Street' to a bank in Queen Street to meet a man who wanted to buy some Whistler etchings, but suddenly Whistler ordered the cabby to return 'back to a corner we had just passed':

'Here a green grocer's shop, with its orderly and colorful array of fruits and vegetables, had caught Whistler's eyes as we whirled by. He surveyed it now critically from two different positions ... "Isn't it beautiful!" exclaimed Whistler. He pointed his long cane at one corner. "I believe I'll have that crate of oranges moved over there ̶ against that background of green. Yes, that's better," he added contentedly ... The following morning he posted his easel at the corner and painted the shop.' ²

Terrey's Fruit Shop, Chelsea, The Hunterian

Chase's account of events in the summer of 1885 is rather muddled: Whistler's studio was in fact in the Fulham Road.

Although Chase mentions an easel, which suggests the work was an oil painting, the medium might have been a watercolour, such as Terrey's Fruit Shop, Chelsea m1002.

Images

Subject

Titles

One title has been suggested:

• 'Shop Front' (1980, YMSM). ³

Description

William Merritt Chase described the subject as 'a green grocer's shop, with its orderly and colorful array of fruits and vegetables' and a 'crate of oranges ... against that background of green.' ⁴

An Orange Note: Sweet Shop, Freer Gallery of Art

Terrey's Fruit Shop, Chelsea, The Hunterian

A pile of oranges dominates the shop window in An Orange Note: Sweet Shop y264 but it dates from 1883 or at latest 1884. No other oil appears to match the description. Whistler painted watercolours of similar subjects including Terrey's Fruit Shop, Chelsea m1002. The painting described by Chase – whether oil or watercolour – has not been identified.

Site

Chelsea, London, UK.

Technique

Technique

Unknown. It is possible this was a watercolour.

Conservation History

Unknown.

Frame

Unknown.

History

Provenance

Unknown.

Exhibitions

Unknown.

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. 323) as 'Shop Front'.

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

• Roof, Katharine Metcalf, The life and art of William Merritt Chase, New York, 1917, pp. 120-22.

Websites

• None.

Unpublished

• None.

Other

• None.