UNIVERSITY of GLASGOW

Etchings         Institutions search term: grolier club

Jews' Quarter, Amsterdam

Impression: Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
(1934.610)
Number: 449
Date: 1889
Medium: etching
Size: 132 x 221 mm
Signed: butterfly at upper left
Inscribed: no
Set/Publication: no
No. of States: 1
Known impressions: 4
Catalogues: K.415; M.412
Impressions taken from this plate  (4)

PUBLICATION

Jews' Quarter, Amsterdam was never published. However, it is closely related to Whistler's clearly defined but unpublished 'Amsterdam Set'.

EXHIBITIONS

The first exhibition was at the gallery of the print dealer Robert Dunthorne (b. ca 1851) in London in 1890. 9 An impression was also shown at the Grolier Club in New York in 1890. Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919) wrote to Whistler on 31 March:

9: London Dunthorne 1890 . See REFERENCES: EXHIBITIONS.

'Next week an important exhibition of your work consisting of a selection of your etchings, ... including the ten Amsterdam prints is to be held in the new Club house of The Grolier Club in N. Y. City - It will undoubtedly attract much attention -' 10

10: GUW #01500.

And on 28 April he wrote again: 'I presume Mr Mansfield has written you about the charming Exhibition of your work recently made at the Grolier Club in New York - All ten of the [Amsterdam] prints herein named were shown - ' 11 Howard Mansfield (1849-1938) actually reported on 15 May:

11: GUW #01501,

'It has given me pleasure to note the favor which your Amsterdam etchings have met with here. Not that anything was needed to strengthen my opinion of their merits, but because of the proof thus furnished of the good taste of our print lovers.' 12

12: GUW #03989.

Whistler's chief art dealers in America, H. Wunderlich & Co., exhibited another impression in 1898. This may have been the impression lent by Bryan Lathrop (1844-1916) to the exhibition organised by the Caxton Club in Chicago in 1900 (Graphic with a link to impression #K4150102). 13

Impressions were also included in the Memorial Exhibitions after Whistler's death, in the Grolier Club in New York in 1904 and in London in 1905. 14

13: Chicago 1900 (cat. no. 299).

14: New York 1904a (cat. no. 290); London Mem. 1905 (cat. no. 357).

SALES & COLLECTORS

There are no records of sales to Robert Dunthorne (b. ca 1851) although he exhibited it in 1890. Whistler did sell one impression on 6 April 1891 to H. Wunderlich & Co. of New York for £12.12.0. 15 He sold them two more on 10 April 1893 for £8.8.0 each. 16 One of these was sold to John Caldwell (fl. 1887-1907) (Graphic with a link to impression #K4150103, stock number 'a 19713'). Bryan Lathrop (1844-1916) owned one by 1900, possibly bought from Wunderlich's (Graphic with a link to impression #K4150102). Another early collector, Harry Brisbane Dick (1855-1916), obtained a unique impression of the cancelled etching (Graphic with a link to impression #K4150201).

15: GUW #13097.

16: Edward Guthrie Kennedy (1849-1932) to Whistler, GUW #07214.