Lithograph printed in black on ivory wove plate paper, 1878. 187x281 mm; 7 3/8x11 1/8 inches, full margins. Edition unknown but likely very small. A superb impression of this extremely scarce, early lithograph.
We have found only 3 other impressions at auction in the past 30 years.
This print is known in a small number of proofs as well as an unknown-size published edition (considered to be very small). Way lists 12 proof impressions, as well as "many hundreds" printed for the magazine Piccadilly. However, Spink, et als., cite a scant 4 proof impressions in public collections and only 8 impressions from the published edition in public collections. Despite Way's claim for the large published edition size, based on auction records over the past three decades and the limited public holdings of this lithograph, the number of extant impressions is likely very small.
This is one of four subjects that Whistler executed for Piccadilly and the only print issued with the magazine, which went out of business only two weeks after the issue containing the lithograph was published (further evidence that Way's "hundreds" of impressions printed for the magazine were not realized). The other Whistler lithographs intended for Picadilly, but never published, are Early Morning, The Toilet and The Tall Bridge (Spink 9, 10 and 12). Way 8; Levy 18; Spink 11.
