PRINTS
Whistler, James McNeill
U.S. (1834 - 1903)
The Forge
1861
Drypoint on Japan paper
7 5/8 x 12 1/2 in. (19.3 x 31.5 cm) plate mark size; 10 x 14 1/2 in. (25.4 x 36.8 cm) sheet size
Stimson Collection, gift of Dorothy Stimson Bullitt
FA 77.176

Whistler's style became looser and more improvisational at this time. During a summer visit to the seaside, Whistler made one drypoint, The Forge. He treated the subject that was a favorite of Romantics and Realists in a new way. Whistler's smith stands like an alchemist, or chef, observing the glowing metal, while his apprentices stand also mesmerized by the transformation taking place in the furnace. Whistler was not concerned with the social message of the forge as work, rather he was more interested in the shifting illumination in the dusky room. -- Label copy for James McNeill Whistler: A Dreamer Apart, Reed Gallery, March 27 - June 15, 1990.

A prolific painter, James McNeill Whistler was also a master of etching and drypoint. One of the first etchers to take his plates outside, he worked directly from his subject without any initial sketches. The Forge, most likely created in this manner, was included in Whistler’s second set of published works, the Thames Set. Reflecting Whistler’s early interest in Realism, the work depicts a gritty industrial subject, a smith laboring before a glowing hearth.

In addition to being a painter, decorator, and writer, Whistler produced over 600 etchings, lithographs and drypoints over the course of his career. His interest in etching almost certainly stemmed from the influence of his brother-in-law and fellow etcher, Sir Francis Seymour Haden, who had a personal collection of old master prints and wrote several books on Rembrandt van Rijn. It was upon Haden’s urging in 1858 that Whistler first began working directly from his surrounding environment. Many of his early works focus on contemporary street scenes, dockyards, alleyways, and shop fronts. Even when working in Venice, Whistler frequently avoided elaborate tourist destinations, preferring to etch scenes of ordinary and unadorned neighborhoods, thereby discovering the marvelous in the everyday. -- Label copy for 150 Works of Art, October 1, 2005 to February 26, 2006.