UNIVERSITY of GLASGOW

Etchings         Institutions search term: wunderlich

Piccadilly

Impression: Hunterian Art Gallery
Hunterian Art Gallery
(46893)
Number: 256
Date: 1886
Medium: etching
Size: 111 x 70 mm
Signed: butterfly at right
Inscribed: no
Set/Publication: no
No. of States: 1
Known impressions: 11
Catalogues: K.256; M.252; W.208
Impressions taken from this plate  (11)

KEYWORD

city, people, street, streetscape.

TITLE

There are small variations in the title, but all mention the site, Piccadilly:


'Piccadilly' (1887, Whistler). 2
'A Fragment of Piccadilly ' (1887/1888, Whistler). 3
'A Fragment of Piccadilly' (1899, Frederick Wedmore (1844-1921)). 4



Wedmore's title is unusual, and it is based on the fact that only a part of the street scene was completed. However, Whistler first referred to it as 'Piccadilly' and this is the preferred title.

2: To Dowdeswell, 27 July 1887, GUW #08677.

3: List, [August 1887/1888], GUW #13233.

4: Wedmore 1899 (cat. no. 208).

DESCRIPTION

A broad street appears in the top half of the plate, with a row of three- and four-storey buildings at upper right. There are groups of figures on the pavements. The nearest figure at right is a man wearing a top hat and dark coat.

SITE

Piccadilly, London, UK. Whistler enjoyed the bustle of the fashionable street. When temporarily working in Venice he wrote, 'I am bored to death after a certain time away from Piccadilly! - I pine for Pall Mall and I long for a hansom! - ' 5

5: To H. E. Whistler, [October/November 1879], GUW #06686.

DISCUSSION

The subject is comparable to St James's Street [178], but in scale is closer to St James's Park [250]. It is curious that one of the busiest streets in central London was depicted by Whistler as an almost empty space, on a miniature scale.