The Manager's Window, Gaiety Theatre
Medium
Transfer lithograph in black on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Image: 17.3 × 13.6 cm (6 13/16 × 5 3/8 in.); Sheet: 25 × 19.3 cm (9 7/8 × 7 5/8 in.)
Classification
transfer lithograph
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
147856
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
The original Gaiety Theatre was located on the Strand, with a stage entrance on Wellington Street, across the road from the offices of Whistler’s London printers, the Ways. The artist made three lithographs of the back of the theater, drawn from the Ways’ windows. He attended performances there as well, making two paintings of a member of the dancing troupe, “Gaiety Girl” Connie Gilchrist, whom he posed in his studio skipping rope in a replication of her performances on stage.
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...