Portraits, Pastels, Prints: Whistler in The Frick Collection
June 2 through August 23, 2009
Venetian Canal, 1880, pastel on brown paper
Pastels and Prints:
Whistler in Venice
In 1879 Whistler traveled to Venice to create a series of twelve etchings commissioned by the
Fine Art Society in London. Beguiled by the city, he stayed for fourteen months instead of
the allotted three and completed approximately fifty etchings. Venice’s luminous expanses
of sky and sea also inspired Whistler to sketch some hundred landscapes in pastel, a medium
he had previously reserved for portraits and figure studies.
Whistler’s challenge was to capture Venice’s ethereal beauty in a new way. In a letter of
1880 he declared: “I have learned to know a Venice in Venice that others never seem to have
perceived . . . ” His pastels and etchings present the quiet streets and backwaters that lie
beyond the Grand Canal, marking a deliberate departure from the tradition of vedute, majestic
views of the city’s principal sites. As one scholar observed, Whistler aimed to capture “the
essence of the crumbling city: its texture, its light, its distinctive enclosed calli [streets] and
piazze [squares], and its unique ‘floating’ quality.”
The artist carried pastel and etching materials with him as he explored the city. He would
begin an etching by drawing with a needle on a copper plate covered with a waxy ground.
In his studio he applied acid to bite the exposed areas of copper, producing a matrix of lines to
be inked and printed. To convey Venice’s unique light and atmosphere, Whistler enhanced his
compositions with drypoint and plate tone. In drypoint the artist directly incises the plate with
a fine tool, raising tiny curls of copper on either side of his lines. This metal burr holds a great
deal of ink, and, in printing, the lines swell with velvety tone. Whistler left a film of ink on
the surface (plate tone), wiping certain areas to create gradations of tone that evoke different
conditions of light. He achieved similar atmospheric effects in pastel, fusing light, form, and
vibrant color in seamless unity.
The prints in this section represent Whistler’s selection of twelve etchings, now called the First
Venice Set, to fulfill the Fine Art Society commission. Though he had been charged to print
one hundred impressions of each plate, Whistler treated each one as a unique work of art.
He often made small changes to a plate between printings — creating different states of
the composition — and varied the amount of plate tone. A small tab on each etching bears
Whistler’s butterfly signature and the abbreviation “imp.” (impressit), indicating that the artist printed the impression himself.
View pastels in the exhibition | View etchings in the exhibition