The Menpes Children |  Freer Gallery of Art (1909.117) | |
| Number: | 300 | |
| Date: | 1887 | |
| Medium: | etching | |
| Size: | 68 x 101 mm | |
| Signed: | butterfly at lower left | |
| Inscribed: | no | |
| Set/Publication: | M. Menpes, 'Whistler as I Knew Him', London, 1904 | |
| No. of States: | 1 | |
| Known impressions: | 12 | |
| Catalogues: | K.261; M.257; W.212 | |
| Impressions taken from this plate (12) | ||
TECHNIQUE
It was drawn with expressive, broken outlines, and is etched, with no drypoint.
PRINTING
Howard Mansfield (1849-1938) stated that 'One of the two proofs printed in the artist's lifetime is in the Mansfield Collection' (i.e. ). 7 The other is probably . They are both printed in dark brown ink on cream laid paper with a partial watermark involving a ravening lion, or, in heraldic terms, a lion rampant.
7: Mansfield 1909[more] (cat. no. 257).
One impression on cream 'modern' (post-1800) laid paper was definitely trimmed to the platemark and signed on the tab with a butterfly that could date from about 1887 (). An impression on ivory laid paper, not trimmed or signed, may be an early impression (). Another is in dark brown ink on cream 'antique' laid paper, and was trimmed to the platemark, leaving a tab and a squashed butterfly signature, but was neither trimmed nor signed by Whistler ().
The etching was published after Whistler's death in a limited edition of 500 impressions, in the book written and signed by Mortimer Luddington Menpes (1860-1938). 8 A selection of these, which have been removed from the volume, is included here.
8: Menpes 1904 A[more].