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Lobster Pots - Selsea Bill

Impression: Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
(1917.469)
Number: 241
Date: 1880/1881
Medium: etching and drypoint
Size: 121 x 203 mm
Signed: butterfly at lower right
Inscribed: 'Selsea Bill'
Set/Publication: 'Second Venice Set', 1886
No. of States: 4
Known impressions: 32
Catalogues: K.235; M.233; W.174
Impressions taken from this plate  (32)

TECHNIQUE

Whistler began the plate in pure etching and added just a few drypoint touches to the background to indicate sailing vessels and figures. It is clear that the drypoint details were added, rather than removed as Kennedy had thought, because traces of those lines are visible on impressions taken from the plate after it had been cancelled.

PRINTING

No impressions of the first state of Lobster Pots - Selsea Bill have been located, but impressions of the second state are in black ink, including ones on ivory laid paper watermarked with a crown over '1852' (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350303) and beige laid paper with a partial crown watermark (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350202). Third states, still in black ink, are on cream laid paper with an indistinct '4WR' watermark (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350205) and beige laid paper with a partial crown watermark (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350202). 9

9: Printing list, GUW #08717.

Lobster Pots - Selsea Bill was published by Messrs Dowdeswell and Thibaudeau with A Set of Twenty-six Etchings (the 'Second Venice Set') in 1886. There are numerous dockets, receipts and lists recording the printing and delivery of the edition. Twelve impressions of Lobster Pots - Selsea Bill were delivered on 28 July, two on 20 August, eleven on 21 October and eight on 26 October 1886, making a total of 36. 10

10: Whistler to W. Dowdeswell, [16 July 1887], GUW #08717.

Later impressions - all of the fourth state - were printed in dark brown ink on a variety of papers: ivory laid paper with a foolscap watermark (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350102); cream 'antique' (pre-1800) laid, possibly with part of a Strasbourg Lily 'VG' watermark (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350104); ivory laid with a partial watermark, 'WR' (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350106); and Asian laid paper (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350105). Several were printed in brown (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350103, Graphic with a link to impression #K2350302, Graphic with a link to impression #K2350304) or black ink (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350107, Graphic with a link to impression #K2350313, Graphic with a link to impression #K2350305) on ivory laid paper. Others are in black ink on buff laid paper (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350306), and fine light-weight cream laid (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350311). A cancelled impression is in black ink on a heavy-weight ivory laid paper (Graphic with a link to impression #K2350402).