Reading by Lamplight
Medium
Etching and drypoint, with foul biting, in black on cream laid paper
Dimensions
Plate: 16 × 11.9 cm (6 5/16 × 4 11/16 in.); Sheet: 23.2 × 16.8 cm (9 3/16 × 6 5/8 in.)
Classification
etching
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
73412
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
Long before Whistler conceived of the portrait of his mother, his most important early models were his half-sister, Deborah Haden, and her family. Deborah was married to the physician, print collector, and amateur artist Francis Seymour Haden, and they had three children, Annie, Seymour, and Arthur. During one visit in 1859, Whistler created ambitious but personal depictions of the family, including the multifigure The Music Room (1917.444), which portrays the couple along with Haden’s medical p...
About the Artist
James McNeill Whistler · 1834–1903
James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) was an American-born painter and printmaker who became a leading figure in the Aesthetic Movement and pioneer of Tonalism and Japonisme. He revolutionized art by championing "art for art's sake" and treating paintings as visual equivalents of musical compositions, titling works as "arrangements," "harmonies," and "nocturnes" to emphasize formal qualities o...