The Steps
date: label: Date
content: 1880
name: label: Artist
content: James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903)
notes: label: Label
content: Aesthetically conservative reviewers condemned Whistler's pastels for their lack of conventional "finish." The reviewer for the World, for example, concluded that Mr. Whistler is "too soon satisfied with mere intimations and suggestions; he holds his hand while completeness is yet afar off; his impressions are slight, or he indicates them too faintly, vaguely, and incoherently. How many of these pastels suffer from the vacant spaces 'to let' of plain untinctured brown paper, from indecision of line, from lack of foreground, from the absence, indeed, of industry and conscientious workmanship!"
label: Label
content: Quotation from "Fine Arts: Mr. Whistler's 'Venice Pastels,'" World, February 2, 1881.
label: Provenance
content: To 1917
label: Provenance
content: Mrs. Louisine Havemeyer, New York to 1917 [1]
label: Provenance
content: From 1917 to 1919
label: Provenance
content: Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919), given by Mrs. Louisine Havemeyer in 1917 [2]
label: Provenance
content: From 1920
label: Provenance
content: Freer Gallery of Art, gift of Charles Lang Freer in 1920 [3]
label: Provenance
content: Notes:
label: Provenance
content: [1] See Original Whistler List, pg. 16, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives. See also, a letter from Mrs. Havemeyer in Envelope File.
label: Provenance
content: [2] See note 1.
label: Provenance
content: [3] The original deed of Charles Lang Freer's gift was signed in 1906. The collection was received in 1920 upon the completion of the Freer Gallery.
label: Collection
content: Freer Gallery of Art Collection
label: Exhibition History
content: Whistler: Streetscapes, Urban Change (November 18, 2023 to May 4, 2024)
label: Exhibition History
content: Whistler in Venice: The Pastels (January 19 to June 15, 2003)
label: Exhibition History
content: James McNeill Whistler at the Freer Gallery of Art—Whistler and the Landscape (May 11, 1984 to February 5, 1985)
label: Exhibition History
content: James McNeill Whistler Pastels, Etchings, Paintings, Watercolors (November 11, 1976 to June 24, 1977)
label: Exhibition History
content: Whistler Pastels and Water Colors (July 1 to July 31, 1974)
label: Exhibition History
content: Untitled Exhibition, Whistler Paintings and Drawings (December 14, 1955 to February 25, 1956)
label: Exhibition History
content: Untitled Exhibition, Works of Whistler (September 22, 1947 to April 11, 1955)
label: Exhibition History
content: Untitled Exhibition, Whistler Watercolors, Oil Paintings, and Pastels (January 20, 1944 to October 13, 1947)
label: Exhibition History
content: Whistler Pastels and Drawings, Re-arranged and some additions (January 7, 1924 to January 20, 1944)
label: Exhibition History
content: American Paintings, Pastels, and Water Colors, and Drawings. J.A.McN. Whistler (May 2, 1923 to January 7, 1924)
label: Previous custodian or owner
content: Mrs. Louisine Havemeyer (1855-1929) (C.L. Freer source)
label: Previous custodian or owner
content: Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919)
place: label: Origin
content: United States
topic: label: Topic
content: United States
label: Topic
content: American Art
label: Topic
content: store front
label: Topic
content: Charles Lang Freer collection
setName: label: Related Online Resources
content: Google Arts & Culture
label: See more items in
content: Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Collection
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Charles Lang Freer
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: F1917.4a-b
objectType: label: Type
content: Drawing
objectRights: label: Restrictions & Rights
content: CC0
physicalDescription: label: Medium
content: Chalk and pastel on brown paper
label: Dimensions
content: H x W: 19.4 x 30.1 cm (7 5/8 x 11 7/8 in)