The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas dates from 1890. ¹ According to the sitter, Amy Marguerite Brandon Thomas (Mrs Barnes-Brand) (1890-1974), this was probably painted in the autumn of 1890. ²

Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas, frame, detail

A label on the stretcher, written by Walter Richard Sickert (1860-1942), reads:

'Portrait of Amy Brandon Thomas painted in my studio 13 Robert Street N.W. by James McNeill Whistler.'

Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas , Whereabouts unknown

It was finally sent by Whistler to the sitter's father Brandon Thomas (1849-1914) in 1895. He thanked Whistler enthusiastically:

'I was sure you would have sent us the sketch sooner but I know how you had been racked with terrible anxieties so did not bother you with letters. All the same we have been keeping its place on the drawing room wall waiting & hoping! I knew it was beautiful & I hope to the lord you won't do anything to it unless you are quite mad to do it, for an alteration is not always an improvement in dramatic things & it may be so, for all I know, in painting! And it was just lovely. A spirit, a shadow, a divine sketch - we shall be quite content with it as it is I can tell you!' ³

Images

Subject

Titles

Two titles have been suggested:

• 'Portrait of a Baby' (1905, ISSPG). ⁴
• 'Portrait of Amy Brandon-Thomas' (after 1924, W. R. Sickert). ⁵
• 'Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas' (1980, YMSM). ⁶

'Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas' is the preferred title.

Description

Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas, Whereabouts unknown

A sketch portrait of a baby with brown hair, facing the viewer, dressed in a white dress with a large collar or bib. It is in vertical format.

Sitter

Bassano Ltd, Amy Brandon Thomas, photograph, 1914, National Portrait Gallery, London, NPG x101387

Amy Marguerite Brandon Thomas (Mrs Barnes-Brand) (1890-1974) was born on 9 March 1890 and died on 6 May 1974. She was an English film and stage actress.

She was the daughter of the playwright Brandon Thomas (1849-1914), an ardent admirer of Whistler. He and his wife appear in a lithograph, The Garden c040, drawn by Whistler at Cheyne Walk in 1891.

As a baby, she was taken to sittings by Miss Missen, the family nurse. ⁷

According to Clifford, several months after starting this portrait Whistler asked Mrs Thomas to bring Amy for further sittings. She had been six months old when she first posed, but when she was brought again she had grown out of all recognition. Whistler told her mother he 'wanted the one he had before' and sent them both home. ⁸

Technique

Technique

Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas, Whereabouts unknown

The face is painted thinly, with expressive brushstrokes, but much of the canvas is bare. Despite the lack of finish it appears very direct and fresh in colour.

Conservation History

Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas, photograph, 1980

Unknown.

Frame

Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas, frame

Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas, frame, detail

A frame by Frederick Henry Grau (1859-1892), probably dating from 1892. ⁹

History

Provenance

• 1895: Brandon Thomas (1849-1914);
• 1914: bequeathed to the sitter, Amy Marguerite Brandon Thomas (Mrs Barnes-Brand) (1890-1974), Shamley Green, Surrey, who owned it until at least 1960.
• October 1967: with Christie's, London.
• 1981: Sotheby Parke-Bernet, New York, 29 May 1981 (lot 6) bought in;
• 1982: Sotheby's, New York 4 June 1982 (lot 32) bought by the Fine Art Society, London (stock #10118);
• 1983: sold to Forbes Magazine Inc.
• 2017: present whereabouts unknown.

It was sent to Brandon Thomas in September 1895: it is not known if he actually commissioned it. ¹⁰

The last known exhibition of this portrait was in 2003, when it was shown at The Fine Art Society in London. Items from the Forbes Collection were sold over several years, including a major sale at Christie's on 19-20 February 2003. However, the current whereabouts of this portrait is unknown.

Exhibitions

• 1905: Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 46).
• 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. 76) as 'Portrait of a Baby'.

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. 392), plate 246, as 'Portrait of Miss Amy Brandon Thomas'.

Authored by Whistler

• None.

Catalogues 1855-1905

EXHIBITION:

• Œuvres de James McNeill Whistler, Palais de l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1905 (cat. no. 46).
• 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. 76) as 'Portrait of a Baby'.

Journals 1855-1905

• None.

Monographs

• None.

Books on Whistler

• None.

Books, General

• Brandon-Thomas, Jevan, Charley's Aunt's Father: A Life of Brandon Thomas, London, 1955, p. 145.
• Casteras, ‎Susan P., Christopher Forbes, ‎Victorian childhood: paintings selected from the Forbes Magazine collection by Christopher Forbes, Yale Center for British Art, New York, 1986, p. 57, pl. 28.

Catalogues 1906-Present

EXHIBITION:

• The Pre-Raphaelites and their Times, Tokyo, Isetan Museum of Art; Hamamatsu City Museum; The Aichi Prefectural Art Gallery; Daimaru Museum of Art; Yamanashi Prefectural Museum of Art, 1985 (cat. no. 50).
• Childhood in Victorian Painting: The Best of Corporate Art in America, The Forbes Magazine Galleries, New York, 1985 (cat. no. 3).
• Chairman’s Choice, The Forbes Magazine Galleries, New York, 1988, and The New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, 1988-1989 (cat. no. 40).
• When We Were Young: Children and Childhood in British Art, 1880-1989, City Art Centre, Edinburgh, 1989 (cat. no. 2) repr.
• 200 Years of American Art from the Forbes Magazine Collection, The Forbes Magazine Galleries, New York, 1999 (cat. no. 21).
• Whistler: A Centenary Tribute, The Fine Art Society, London, 2003 (cat. no. 2) repr.

SALE:

• Sotheby Parke Bernet, New York, 29 May 1981 (lot 6).
• Sotheby's, New York 4 June 1982 (lot 32).

Journals 1906-Present

• Clifford, H. Dalton, 'A Farmhouse Converted for Comfort', Country Life, 127, 3 March 1960, pp. 438-39, at p. 439, repr.

Websites

• None.

Unpublished

• Revillon, Joseph Whistler, Draft Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of J. McN. Whistler, [ca 1945-1955], Glasgow University Library (cat. no. 311).

Other

• None