?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,500 - $ 2,500
JAMES A. M. WHISTLER Drouet.
Etching, 1859. 227x153 mm; 8 7/8x6 inches, small margins. Second state (of 2). A richly-inked impression with warm plate tone.
In this etching of his friend, the Parisian sculptor and collector Charles Drouet (1836-1908), Whistler finished only the sitter's head, leaving the body outlined by lightly-sketched lines, as was typical for his portraits at the time.
The art dealer Frederick Keppel acquired this plate after it had been cancelled with only a couple of lightly-etched diagonal lines through the background and face. He had the master-printer Frederick Goulding burnish away the cancellation lines and print impressions that were sold against Whistler's will. On these impressions, which greatly outnumber the pre-cancellation impressions, remnants of the cancellation lines are visible through Drouet's left eye and the bridge of his nose. Kennedy 55.
