Whistler: Butterfly monogram

James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903)
ca. 1890
Crayon on paper
F1904.446

James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903)
United States, 1894-1903
Oil on canvas
H x W: 74.7 x 50.5 cm
Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1903.89

Whistler described this female nude as "a figure to, in a way, hint at 'Spring.'" It held a special significance for both the artist and for Charles Lang Freer, who had commissioned—and paid for—the work in 1894 but did not take possession of it until the artist's death in 1903. When Whistler's wife Beatrix lay dying of cancer in 1896, the expatriate wrote to his patron in Detroit that he had continued to work on the painting, in part to ease his grief. "I write to you many letters on your canvas," he explained to Freer, and indeed, the multiple layers of paint around the model's face convey Whistler's almost obsessive reworking of the surface.

Whistler designed and painted the frame to harmonize with both the figure and the checkerboard pattern of the rug on which she stands. Whistler thought the frame was an important element in the overall design of a work of art. Here, he signed it with his trademark butterfly, ensuring that the frame and image would be understood as two parts of a whole.

James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903)
United States, 1871-72
Oil on canvas
H x W: 62.7 x 40.5 cm
Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1902.249a-b

After Whistler moved from Paris to London in 1859, he found the Thames to be a constant source of inspiration. He spent many hours on the river, gathering impressions that were later recorded on canvas his second-story studio in Chelsea, which itself afforded a view of the river and its distinctly modern, industrial environs.

In 1872, when Whistler painted Variations in Pink and Grey: Chelsea, his view included the construction of the Chelsea Embankment, a major public works project designed to reclaim land around the Thames and that included the construction of massive walls and landing stages along the river bank. Here, the artist has incorporated construction fences and even the new saplings that were part of the urban planning project. Even so, Whistler has overlaid the scene with deliberate artifice, using the flattened forms, bird's-eye perspective, and asymmetrical compositional principles of Japanese prints to create a decorative, rather than a realistic, image. By placing his signature butterfly on the frame (which Whistler designed specifically for this painting) as well as on the canvas itself, he calls attention to the framed, artful nature of the image.