UNIVERSITY of GLASGOW

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Little Smithfield

Impression: Colby College Museum of Art, Maine
Colby College Museum of Art, Maine
(061.2007)
Number: 154
Date: 1875
Medium: etching
Size: 136 x 99 mm
Signed: no
Inscribed: no
Set/Publication: no
No. of States: 1
Known impressions: 7
Catalogues: K.160; M.157; W.78
Impressions taken from this plate  (7)
Etching: PK160_01 (plate)
The copper plate bears the maker's oval stamp: 'HUGHES & KIMBER / MANUFACTURERS / LONDON E.C.' This form of the stamp was used mainly between 1873 and 1875 (see for instance Resting [111], Reading a Book [112], A Lady at a Window [148], The Piano [144] and Shipbuilder's Yard, Liverpool [142]).
It is, however, similar in size to plates from throughout Whistler's career, including etchings from the late 1850s such as Seymour Haden, Jr, Seated [9], up to etchings of the late 1880s including Bird Shop - Seven Dials [384].
The plate was given by Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958) to the University of Glasgow in 1935. It is not known if she inherited it from Whistler or if it was sold at the time of his bankruptcy and later retrieved by the artist, or by Miss Philip, from the Fine Art Society or from Robert Dunthorne (b. ca 1851). It was cancelled posthumously with a diagonal line across the lower right corner.