Owned by Arthur Studd
SYMPHONY IN WHITE, II: THE LITTLE WHITE GIRL.
"La Princesse du Pays de la Porcelaine" (Whistler apparently was fond of using elaborate titles) is perhaps his finest work in vivid colouring. The colour differentiations are well placed, but the canvas, after all, looks too much like a huge Japanese print, painted in the Western style, which represents objects round and in relief, and not merely in flat tints. The placing of the screen with the face looming above it is as peculiar as it is attractive, but it is an arrangement that is strictly Japanese in character. Whistler began with painting detail, and only gradually learned to see life in a broader and more mysterious way. It is a portrait of Miss Christie Spartali, a real Rossetti type, daughter of the Consul-General for Greece in London in 1863. Her father did not like it; but Rossetti did, and sold it from his own studio to help Whistler along. Later it came into the possession of F. R. Leyland, and was used to decorate the "Peacock Room." It was first exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1865. It is really a combination of Rossetti and Outomaro, with a slight flavour of Whistler's individuality.
National Gallery, Washington
THE PRINCESS OF THE PORCELAIN LAND.
"On the Balcony" (exhibited first in 1866) of the Freer collection is a peculiar combination of models masquerading in kimonos and a background of English river scenery. He essayed the same task as Chavannes in his mural decorations, i. e., to determine the local tints of each face or arm by the surrounding colours. The problem was made still more difficult by showing each face in a different illumination. One face is silhouetted in profile against the river, another shaded by a fan and the form of a standing figure, the others are seen in front light. I do not believe he has ever attempted a more ambitious problem, and he solved it in a most subtle and convincing fashion. It is a delightful harmony in colour, and exceedingly well-balanced; it reminds one of the Japanese, but the colour and vibrating atmosphere is Occidental. Pity that he found it necessary to introduce Japanese costumes. I perfectly realize that one of the principal charms of this picture is the incongruity of the ensemble. Yet who ever saw in a London town such a balcony with Japanese awnings, and English girls dressed up like geishas, whiling away the early hours of the night. The figures belong neither to Japan nor Great Britain. They are simply there for colour's sake, but, after all, such associations of thought, no matter whether in paint or poetry, never constitute the greatest art. The composition is more restful and simpler than in his earlier works. When Whistler began to realize this shortcoming of his earlier style, he turned away from "orchestral explosions of colour" and "volleys of paint," and began that wonderful process of elimination which helped him to become one of the greatest painters of the nineteenth century.