James Abbott McNeill Whistler, RBA,  American 1834-1903-  L

Lot description

James Abbott McNeill Whistler, RBA, American 1834-1903- La Rétameuse (1858); etching in black ink on chine appliqué, signed 'Whistler' (within the plate, lower right), 11 x 8.9 cm. Provenance: with The Fine Art Society, London. Property from a Distinguished British Private Collection. Exhibited: London, The Fine Art Society, July 2003. Literature: Kennedy 14. Note: 'Whistler portrays a poor elderly woman in old-fashioned garb wearing a distinctive bonnet. "La Rétameuse" translates as tinker, a travelling repairer of tinware and the subject has thrust what may be a shuttle, or large spoon, into the waist of her apron. Several of the etchings that the artist published in "Douze eau-fortes d'apres Nature" (Twelve Etchings from Nature) in 1858 center on French women who worked into old age. He presented them without sentiment or idealization but with an awareness that society's need for their skills was being swept away by industrialization. The sensitive detailed etching of this subject's irregular facial features contrasts with looser open lines elsewhere in the image, a handling that echoes Rembrandt whose prints Whistler knew from the collection of his brother-in-law Seymour Haden.' (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).