The Steps, Gray's Inn |  Freer Gallery of Art (1888.17) | |
| Number: | 282 | |
| Date: | 1887 | |
| Medium: | etching | |
| Size: | 67 x 179 mm | |
| Signed: | butterfly at upper left | |
| Inscribed: | no | |
| Set/Publication: | no | |
| No. of States: | 1 | |
| Known impressions: | 7 | |
| Catalogues: | K.295; M.290 | |
| Impressions taken from this plate (7) | ||
The copper plate has no maker's mark. It is close in size to several plates of similar date including Dry Docks, Southampton [302], The Canal, Ostend [352], and Flower Market, Brussels [339] - all dating from 1887.
It was in Whistler's studio at his death and was bequeathed to his sister-in-law Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958), who asked Nathaniel Sparks (1880-1956) to print some proofs. 6 It was then cancelled with a diagonal line at right. She gave the plate to the University of Glasgow in 1935.
It was in Whistler's studio at his death and was bequeathed to his sister-in-law Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958), who asked Nathaniel Sparks (1880-1956) to print some proofs. 6 It was then cancelled with a diagonal line at right. She gave the plate to the University of Glasgow in 1935.
6: Martin Hopkinson, 'Nathaniel Sparks's Printing of Whistler's Etchings', Print Quarterly, 1999, Vol. 16, No. 4, pp. 340, 343, 349.