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The Little Cloak

Impression: Freer Gallery of Art
Freer Gallery of Art
(1903.150)
Number: 370
Date: 1887
Medium: etching
Size: 83 x 52 mm
Signed: no
Inscribed: no
Set/Publication: no
No. of States: 1
Known impressions: 3
Catalogues: K.336; M.332
Impressions taken from this plate  (3)

PUBLICATION

The Little Cloak was never published.

EXHIBITIONS

It was not exhibited in Britain, as far as is known. It was first shown in New York, by H. Wunderlich & Co. in 1903, and a year later an impression was lent by Frederick Keppel (1845-1912) to the comprehensive Whistler exhibition at the Grolier Club, New York. 13

13: New York 1903b (cat. no. 248); New York 1904a (cat. no. 340).

SALES & COLLECTORS

Whistler recorded two sales to Thomas M. McLean (b. ca 1832), who bought it under two titles - 'The Cloak' in 1887 and 'The Little Cloak' in 1888 - for £4.4.0 on each occasion. 14

Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919) bought one impression from Messrs Obach & Co. on 11 July 1903 (Graphic with a link to impression #K3360102); this was said to come from the Cox collection, possibly that of James Cox-Cox (ca 1849- d.1901). Freer bequeathed it to the Freer Gallery of Art. Howard Mansfield (1849-1938) owned another, which was sold through A. A. Hahlo & Co., New York, to Harris G. Whittemore (d. ca 1937), and later acquired by the Library of Congress (Graphic with a link to impression #K3360104). The third was bought by Lessing Julius Rosenwald (1891-1971), who gave it to the National Gallery of Art in 1943 (Graphic with a link to impression #K3360103). Thus all three known impressions ended up in Washington DC.

14: Whistler to T. McLean, 5 October 1887 and 11[?] February 1888, GUW #13014, #13018.