Early Works

Through his friend, Whistler met Courbet whose realism inspired most of his early works including At the Piano which was first rejected by the Salon in 1859, but was well recieved at the Royal Academy in 1860. In this time Whistler began to make a name for himself and soon started a series of etchings in Paris where the revival of etchings with artistic creativity was begining to take place. This is were his obscure landscapes and humble figures first started to show up. Soon after his success with At the Piano he traveled to Amsterdam where he was deeply enthralled by the rivers and canals and recorded many canals and areas of water. In his next piece Symphony NO. 1, The White Girl as well as Symphony in White No. 1, The Little White Girl Wistler's fasination for Japanese art had started to show through elements in his work and was rejected at both the Salon and Royal Academy. His fasination for the east took his paintings even further with Purple and Rose: The Lange Leizen of the Six Marks. From 1861 to 1865 James Abbott Whistler's style evolved into a radically new vision of space. For example, The Coast of Brittany and The Beach at Selsey Bill depicts the same information and colors but the effect in The Beach at Selsey Bill is tipping the landscape up towards us with the beach turning into a massive flat plain of color. The figures also become notes of color instead of a sleeping fisher girl complete with a costume.With this sense of space Whistler began painting with the minimum number of pictorial elements and strokes to show his message. In 1866 Whistler ventured over to South America to paint seascapes. After returning back to Paris he began a series of great figure compositions called the Six Projects which was influenced by Albert Moore. He never really finished this commision but the wash and glazing techniques and attention to decorative designs were there to stay.

Works Sited:

Pioch, Nicolas. "Whistler, James Abbott McNeill". WebMuseum. BMW Foundation, 14Oct. 2002. Web. 10 Nov. 2009. http://www.ibilio.org/wm/paint/auth/whistler/

Holden, Donald. Whistler Landscapes and Seascapes. New York, New York: Watson-Guptill Publications, 1969.

Sutton, Denys. James McNeil Whistler. London, England: Phaidon Press LTD, 1966.