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Rue des Bons Enfants, Tours

Impression: Hunterian Art Gallery
Hunterian Art Gallery
(46986)
Number: 392
Date: 1888
Medium: etching and drypoint
Size: 149 x 80 mm
Signed: butterfly at left
Inscribed: no
Set/Publication: no
No. of States: 5
Known impressions: 10
Catalogues: K.372; M.372; W.320
Impressions taken from this plate  (10)

PUBLICATION

Rue des Bons Enfants, Tours was not published, although it is related to the 'Renaissance Set'.

EXHIBITIONS

Rue des Bons Enfants, Tours was exhibited by H. Wunderlich & Co. in New York in 1898 and 1903. An impression was lent by Bryan Lathrop (1844-1916) to the exhibition organised by the Caxton Club in Chicago in 1900 (Graphic with a link to impression #K3720302). 9

After Whistler's death impressions were shown in several Memorial Exhibitions, at the Grolier Club, New York in 1904, in Paris in 1905, in London, lent by F. Keppel & Co., New York print dealers, also in 1905, and in Rotterdam in 1906, lent by Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958) (probably Graphic with a link to impression #K3720103). 10

9: Chicago 1900 (cat. no. 312); see REFERENCES: EXHIBITIONS.

10: London Mem. 1905 (cat. no. 320); Rotterdam 1906 (cat. no. 60).

SALES & COLLECTORS

Whistler recorded selling an impression of the 'first state' on 27 March 1889 to the Fine Art Society, London print dealers, for £7.7.0. 11 This may have been the impression inscribed '1st. Proof' that was later bought by H. Wunderlich & Co. (stock no. a 35171), sold to John Henry Wrenn (1841-1911), and ultimately bequeathed by Ethel Wrenn (dates unknown) to the Art Institute of Chicago (Graphic with a link to impression #K3720102).

11: Whistler to E.G. Brown, GUW #13000.

An impression of the second state inscribed - slightly misleadingly - '1st state', was kept by Whistler, and bequeathed to his sister-in-law Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958), and by her to the University of Glasgow (Graphic with a link to impression #K3720103).

Whistler sold several impressions to New York print dealers: on 16 April 1889 to H. Wunderlich & Co. for £6.6.0, and on 20 July 1889 to Knoedler & Co., also for £6.6.0. 12 The impression sold to Wunderlich's was '14' in the sales list, and that number is written on an impression of the third state bought by Howard Mansfield (1849-1938), later owned by Harris G. Whittemore (d. ca 1937), and given by Claude Wampler (1895) to the Syracuse University Art Galleries (Graphic with a link to impression #K3720203).

12: GUW #13055.

On 18 July 1889 Whistler recorded that he still had six impressions in stock. 13 Two days later, on 20 July he sold another, this time to Knoedler & Co., also for £6.6.0. 14 Ten years later, Whistler sold an impression to Wunderlich's, still at the original price of £6.6.0. 15

Bryan Lathrop (1844-1916) had a very fine fourth state impression by 1900, possibly bought from Wunderlich's (Graphic with a link to impression #K3720302). This also passed to the Art Institute of Chicago. Thus the Art Institute had a first state from the Wrenn collection, a fourth state from Lathrop, and decided to de-accession a fifth state that came to them from Charles Deering (1852-1927) (Graphic with a link to impression #K3720304). At the time both the latter were thought to be Kennedy's third and final state.

13: List, GUW #13235.

14: GUW #13660.

15: Wunderlich's to Whistler, 24 March 1899, GUW #07305.

There were several impressions still in Whistler's studio at his death, two of the second state (Graphic with a link to impression #K3720103, Graphic with a link to impression #K3720202) and two of the final state (Graphic with a link to impression #K3720303, Graphic with a link to impression #K3720402). They were bequeathed to Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958) and by her to the University of Glasgow.