The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler

Date

Sittings for Rose and Gold: 'Pretty Nellie Brown' took place from 1896 to 1897, but Whistler appears to have continued to work on it until he declared it finished in 1900. ¹

1896: It was commissioned by the sitter's father, Ernest George Brown (1851-1915), an art dealer, then at The Fine Art Society. It was started in Whistler's studio at Fitzroy Street, London, in the winter of 1896. On 27 October Whistler postponed a sitting, writing to Mrs Brown:

'I am afraid that after all I shall not be ready for the little Nellie tomorrow - which is a disappointment to me - as I am very fond of her picture -

However it will be really all the better for the few days rest - & time to dry -

… With kindest remembrances to my little sitter, whose hair you must n't cut!' ²

Rose and Gold: 'Pretty Nellie Brown', Philadelphia Museum of Art

1897: On 12 June Whistler wrote that 'Rose and Brown' was nearly finished and set a price of 450 guineas. ³ On 5 July 1897 Whistler asked Mrs Brown if a further sitting could take place on the following day:

'I wonder if it be at all possible for the little Miss Nellie to come to me for a couple of hours tomorrow morning?

If you can forgive such an abrupt notice as this perhaps Nellie might come in with her Papa - say at ten o'clock or half past - and if you were not too much hurried you might come afterwards and so we could lunch or rather déjeuner at 12 o'clock -

I should not keep Nellie later than half past one o'clock.' ⁴

1898: On 4 October Brown asked Whistler for the portrait:

'Will you please allow the bearer to have the picture "Rose and Brown". The cheque for £450 guineas less 10% shall not be "retarded" It is a beautiful picture and I think the purchaser very lucky to get it.' ⁵

However, Whistler did not send him the portrait, and may have continued to work on it.

1900: On 17 May he wrote that he had completed the picture and asked for 600 gns:

'Here you have the "little Nellie - Rose & Red" -

You must not nibble the corner of my cheque! - for you see how beautifully I have brought the picture together

Send me the six hundred guineas clean -

and ask what you like yourselves.' ⁶

Eventually, commenting 'see how pretty the little picture is after what I have done', Whistler accepted £600 while retaining his copyright. ⁷

Images

Subject

Titles

Variations on the title have been suggested:

• 'Rose and Brown' (1897, Whistler). ⁸
• 'little Nellie – Rose & Red' (1900, Whistler). ⁹
• 'Rose and Gold "Pretty Nellie Brown" ' (1904, Copley Society, Boston). ¹⁰
• 'Rose and Gold: "Pretty Nellie Brown" ' (1980, YMSM). ¹¹

Whistler obviously changed his ideas about the dominant colours. Our title "Rose and Gold: 'Pretty Nellie Brown' " is based on the 1904 Copley Society title, the first published title.

The Philadelphia Museum of Art website comments, 'The title of this portrait of the daughter of one of Whistler’s London patrons indicates that a pleasing arrangement of subtle color values, not a scrupulous likeness of the sitter, was the artist’s true aim.' ¹²

Description

Rose and Gold: 'Pretty Nellie Brown', Philadelphia Museum of Art

A half-length portrait of a girl in vertical format. She has brown shoulder-length hair and a deep fringe, and looks directly at the viewer. Her face is lit from the left. She wears a pinkish-brown jacket over a pinkish-white blouse. Her hands are folded in her lap.

Sitter

Helen Elsie Brown (1887-1966) was about ten when she posed to Whistler. Her father Ernest George Brown (1851-1915) was a London art dealer and was working with The Fine Art Society when they commissioned Whistler to make the first set of 'Venice Etchings' in 1879. He was later at the Leicester Galleries. He helped to arrange Whistler's exhibitions with The Fine Art Society: Venice etchings in 1880 and 1883 and pastels in 1881, his lithographs in 1895, and a selection from his collection of silverware in 1902.

Brown married Elsie (Eliza) Taylor in 1895 and lived at Dulwich Village where both their children, Helen ('Nellie', the sitter for this portrait) and Oliver Frank Brown were born. She went on to study music, while Oliver followed his father's footsteps, and became an art dealer.

Technique

Technique

Rose and Gold: 'Pretty Nellie Brown', Philadelphia Museum of Art

It was painted thinly in rich tones of red and brown. There are several areas, particularly round her mouth, but also on her hands and clothes, that were rubbed down by the artist as part of the painting process. The face appears highly-finished, but soft and smooth, while freer, looser brush strokes define the hair and blouse.

Conservation History

Unknown.

History

Provenance

• 1897: bought from Whistler by Ernest George Brown (1851-1915), London;
• 1900: sold through the Fine Art Society to Frank Lusk Babbott (1854-1933);
• 1933: passed on his death to his daughter, Lydia Pratt Babbott (Mrs S. Emlen Stokes) (1895-1988), Moorestown, New Jersey;
• 1988: bequeathed to her daughter, Ann R. Stokes (dates unknown);
• 2002: gift of Ann R. Stokes to the Philadelphia Academy of the Fine Arts.

The painting was kept at The Fine Art Society until August 1900 when, with the help of Howard Mansfield (1849-1938), the print collector, it was sold to Frank Lusk Babbott, Brooklyn, NY. ¹³

Rose and Gold: 'Pretty Nellie Brown', photogravure, 1900, GUL Whistler PH4/60

On 23 August 1900 Whistler wrote to the sitter's father:

'Mr. Dunn writes to say that the "pretty Nellie Brown" is to go to America after all! - I believe though that Mr Ward has made another photogravure of the picture - (he was most anxious to do so) before it leaves.' ¹⁴

Exhibitions

• 1904: Oil Paintings, Water Colors, Pastels and Drawings: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of Mr. J. McNeill Whistler, Copley Society, Boston, 1904 (cat. no. 44) as 'Rose and Gold "Pretty Nellie Brown" '.

It was not, as far as is known, 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. 451), plate 294, as 'Rose and Gold: "Pretty Nellie Brown" '.

Authored by Whistler

• None.

Catalogues 1855-1905

• Oil Paintings, Water Colors, Pastels and Drawings: Memorial Exhibition of the Works of Mr. J. McNeill Whistler, Copley Society, Boston, 1904 (cat. no. 44) as 'Rose and Gold "Pretty Nellie Brown" '.

Journals 1855-1905

• None.

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. 162 (cat. no. 44) repr. frontispiece.
• Pennell, Elizabeth Robins, and Joseph Pennell, The Life of James McNeill Whistler, 2 vols, London and Philadelphia, 1908, vol. 2, p. 204.
• Pennell, Elizabeth Robins, and Joseph Pennell, The Whistler Journal, Philadelphia, 1921, p. 173.

Books, General

• Brown, Oliver, Exhibition: the Memoirs of Oliver Brown, London, 1968, p. 4.

Catalogues 1906-Present

• Whistler Loan Exhibition, Macbeth Gallery, New York, 1947 (cat. no. 8).
• James McNeill Whistler Seventeenth Anniversary Exhibition, Lyman Allyn Museum, New London, CT, 1949 (cat. no. 10).
• Young, A. McLaren, James McNeill Whistler, Arts Council Gallery, London, and Knoedler Galleries, New York, 1960 (cat. no. 68).
• Merrill, Linda, et al., After Whistler: The Artist and His Influence on American Painting, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, 2003, p. 60, repr. fig. 83 (not exhibited).

Journals 1906-Present

• None.

Websites

• Philadelphia Museum of Art website at https://www.pafa.org.

Unpublished

• Revillon, Joseph Whistler, Draft Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of J. McN. Whistler, [ca 1945-1955], Glasgow University Library (cat. no. 280).

Other

• None.