UNIVERSITY of GLASGOW

Etchings         Institutions search term: royal collection

The 'Adam and Eve', Old Chelsea

Impression: Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
(1954.45)
Number: 182
Date: 1878
Medium: etching and drypoint
Size: 175 x 302 mm
Signed: butterfly at upper left (3)
Inscribed: no
Set/Publication: Hogarth and Son, 1879.
No. of States: 3
Known impressions: 92
Catalogues: K.175; M.172; W.144
Impressions taken from this plate  (92)
The copper plate was still in Whistler's hands at the time of his bankruptcy in 1879. James Anderson Rose (1819-1890) wrote, 'Lofts & Warner have included two copper plates [,] one belongs to Hogarth & one to McLean but these must be excluded from my inventory.' 17 It is not known when the plate left Whistler's hands, but eventually it came to America.

The name 'P. J. Platt.' is inscribed on the verso of the copper plate. Peter J. Platt was a professional copper-plate printer in New York, who etched, for instance, plates by John Sloane and Childe Hassam between about 1905 and 1925. It is possible that he printed impressions from the plate.

17: J. A. Rose, possibly to Newton's Auction & Estate Offices, 2 April 1879, GUW #11932.

The plate was cancelled with diagonal lines from corner to corner and three horizontal lines. The plate is now in Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio. 18

18: Acc. No. 1923.3111.