James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903)
James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903)

Marine

Details
James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903)
Marine
signed with artist's butterfly device (lower right)
oil on panel
5 ½ x 9 ¼ in. (14 x 23.5 cm.)
Painted circa 1898-1901.
Provenance
William O'Leary Fine Arts, Detroit, Michigan.
Henry Glover Stevens, Detroit, Michigan, acquired from the above, 1913.
Alice Woodruff Owen, Detroit, Michigan, niece of the above.
Mary Owen Harper, Detroit, Michigan, daughter of the above.
By descent to the present owner.

Lot Essay

This work will be included in the forthcoming online revised catalogue raisonné being prepared by Professor Margaret MacDonald of the University of Glasgow.


In a letter included with this lot, Professor MacDonald writes of Marine, "The fluid brushstrokes on the deep green sea, and the drier strokes on the bright grey and blue sky, suggest a late date, between 1898 and 1901. I think it most likely that it was done in Pourville in 1899. It is similar in some ways to The Shore, Pourville [The Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford, Oxford, England] and Green and Silver: The Great Sea [The Hunterian Museum, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, Scotland] among others."

The present work has been in the same family collection for over a century. The original purchaser, Henry Glover Stevens, notably bequeathed another work by Whistler entitled Arrangement in Gray: Portrait of the Painter (circa 1872) to the Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, Michigan.

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