Description:
buildings in background connected by a bridge; boat with man in foreground rowing on a canal; Venice canal
Label Text:
Whistler was born an American, but spent his life a world traveler. His constant explorations had a great influence on both his paintings and his prints. While Whistler’s reputation as a painter faded following his death and the deaths of his contemporaries, curators and collectors continued to consider his Venetian etchings as among the most important achievements in the history of printmaking. In 1879, Whistler arrived to Venice in a sorry state. Bankrupt from his recent legal battle with John Ruskin, whom he had sued for slander, he accepted a commission from the Fine Arts Institute of London for a series of etchings. The expressiveness of his line and uniqueness of his printing technique make his prints stand out from other artists flocking to Italy at the time. Whistler’s concentration on tone was greatly influenced by Japanese woodcuts, from which he learned to depict transient aspects of nature, such as mist and shade.
Whistler used space and ink to create dimension and atmosphere along the water. Overseeing the inking and printing of each plate, he added surface tone by selectively wiping the copper plates. The ink creates depth and shadow, encouraging the eye to travel across the etching in a circular pattern. In addition, his choice of ink and paper were crucial in the final stages of print, making each etching unique. Whistler’s Venetian etchings received much criticism upon his return to London. Ruskin stated that his artistic prints were intended to disguise bad drawing. Today, Whistler’s etchings are collected around the world and he is acknowledged as one of the greatest printmakers of his time.
In 1879, Whistler accepted a commission from a London gallery to execute a dozen etchings of Venice over a three-month stay. Whistler lingered in Venice for fourteen months, producing over fifty prints as well as some paintings and pastels. The etchings were collected in two sets, known as the First Venice Set (1880) and the Second Venice Set (1886), and they represented a turning point in Whistler’s career. Doing away with any last remnants of anecdotal realism, these impressionist prints evoke a sense of everyday life in Venice using a spare and expressive visual shorthand. With the Venice Sets, Whistler began cutting his sheets at the plate mark, leaving only a tab for his trademark penciled butterfly signature denoting that the impression was printed by him. (AS, "Image and After-Image," 5/22/2012) Additional writing on this object can be found at
Paper + People the Cunningham Center Blog.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=SC+2003.1.2 |
