Chester B. Price Art

Drypoint etching with engraving printed in black ink on Japanese mulberry paper, 4 1/2 x 3 3/8 inches (113 x 84 mm), full margins. In superb condition. A beautiful New York City river...

James Whistler (1834-1903), The Mill, 1889, etching and drypoint, signed in pencil with the butterfly on the tab and inscribed “imp”, and inscribed “first state” (twice) and annotated “Wunderlich” and signed again with the butterfly verso. Reference: Kennedy 413, first state (of 5). Glasgow 457, second state (of 6; see discussion below) (cf. Margaret F. MacDonald, Grischka Petri, Meg Hausberg, and Joanna Meacock, James McNeill Whistler: The Etchings, a catalogue raisonné, University of Glasgow, 2011) On laid paper, in very good condition, trimmed just outside of the platemark all around except for the tab by the artist, 6 1/4 x 9 3/8 inches. A very fine impression of this great rarity, printed in black/brown ink with a slight veil of plate tone. provenance: H. Wunderlich & Co., New York Louis B. Dailey, New York (Lugt 4500) sale, Sotheby’s, New York, October 31, 2003, lot 69 literature; Neue Lagerliste 122: James McNeill Whistler – Etchings...

James Whistler (1834-1903), J.H. Woods’ Fruit Shop, Chelsea, etching and drypoint, 1887-88. Signed with the butterfly on the tab and annotated “imp,” also signed with the butterfly in pencil verso and numbered “1”. References: Kennedy 265 second state (of 2), Glasgow 327 second state (of 4). Trimmed by the artist around the plate mark except for the tab, in excellent condition. Printed in black ink on ivory laid paper, 3 3/4 x 5 1/8 inches. A fine impression of this great rarity; the print was never published. Glasgow accounts for four impressions. watermark: partial arms of Amsterdam(cf. Spink/Stratis/Tedeschi, watermark nos. 12ff.) This is before the third state in which heavy shading was added around the woman at the center, and the heads of figures at right and left of the figure are defined. In Glasgow’s fourth state the shading and the figure were removed; no impression is known of this state, but the state is inferred from the cancelled plate. According to Glasgow “Joseph Henry Wood had a greengrocer’s shop at 1 Park Walk...

The image depicts a restaurant on New York's Mott Street with ornamental iron work on the balconies. There are six figures in the scene in various stages of contrast. Mott Street is considered the unofficial Main Street of New York's Chinatown. Ella Fitzgerald sang it best: “And tell me what street compares with Mott Street in July? Sweet pushcarts gently gliding by.” CFW Mielatz was an early influence on the drypoints and etchings of Martin Lewis. This piece was created in 1906 and it is signed in pencil. It is part of the collection of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art C.F.W. Mielatz American, 1860-1919 Born in Bredding, Germany in 1864, Mielatz emigrated to the United States as a young boy and studied at the Chicago School of Design. Mostly self-taught, his first prints were large New England landscapes reminiscent of the painter-etcher school of American Art. Around 1890 he started to produce prints of New York City and by the time of his death, the number totaled over ninety images. He was a master technician in the field of etching, reworking many of his plates to get the exact feeling he was seeking. Mielatz was a member of the New York Etching...

Lower Manhattan and the Seaport as the artist imagined it would have appeared before 1835. New York: 1907. Etching with drypoint on Japon paper, 13 7/8 x 9 3/4 inches (353 x 248 mm...

James Whistler (1834-1903), The Traghetto, etching and drypoint, 1879-80, signed with the butterfly on the tab and inscribed “imp”. Reference: Kennedy 19...

James Whistler (1834-1903), Old Putney Bridge, 1879, etching and drypoint, signed in pencil with a large, elaborate shaded butterfly, lower right and inscribed imp (also signed with the butterfly in the plate), printed in dark-brown/black ink on laid paper, watermark ProPatria, an impression in Glasgow’s seventh (final) state, published by The Fine Art Society, probably printed in 1881, 8x 11 3/4 inches, sheet 12 1/8 x 16 1/8 inches. Reference: Kennedy 178; Glasgow 185. Provenance: Kraushaar Gallery, New York A fine impression, with wide margins. The Fine Art Societys relationship with Whistler began with the new etchings of the Thames he made in 1879, following a visit from Ernest Brown who had joined the staff of the gallery. The plate is on a large scale and shows the change in the artists approach to the Thames since the etchings he had made in Wapping and the docks in the summer of 1859. The central motif is the old bridge, by this stage somewhat dilapidated. It was shortly to be demolished and replaced by the new bridge of Cornish granite...

James Whistler (1834-1903), The Bridge, Santa Marta, 1879-80, etching with drypoint, printed in sepia on fine laid paper. Signed with the butterfly and inscribed imp on the tab (also with an exceedingly light butterfly lower right in the plate). Kennedy 204, probably eighth (final) state; Glasgow 201, probably state 9 (of 9) (cf. Margaret F. MacDonald, Grischka Petri, Meg Hausberg, and Joanna Meacock, James McNeill Whistler: The Etchings, a catalogue raisonné, University of Glasgow, 2011), Lochnan 199. Trimmed to the platemark by the artist, h: 11.8 x w: 7.9 in / h: 30 x w: 20.1 cm. A fine impression, printed with subtle tone. The bridge theme occurs repeatedly in Whistler’s vistas. It is also the main focus of more than one of the Venetian prints. While some bridges are seen from below, from where one would see it if approaching in a gondola (for example Ponte del Piovan, Kennedy 209), The Bridge depicts the scene from a high perspective, opening up the view into the far distance. The small boat approaching the arch in the foreground is again, as in the earlier Thames prints, a stock motif that is probably ultimately derived from the Japanese woodcuts of Hokusai and Hiroshige. The bridge here is the Ponte de le Terese over the Rio de l’Arzere in the Santa Marta quarter. The early biography of Whistler by Elizabeth and Joseph Pennell is essential for its “immense quantity of information” but also notorious for “the inherent hyperbole and misinformation” (Eric Denker, Annotated Bibliography, in Fine, p. 184). Still, it is worth quoting from the Pennels’ appraisal of The Bridge: “Simplicity of expression has never been carried further. Probably the finest plate, in its simplicity and directness, is The Bridge. Whistler now obtained the quality of richness by suggesting detail, and also by printing. In The Traghetto...

James Whistler (1830-1903), Battersea Morn (also Battersea Dawn), drypoint, 1875, Kennedy 155, signed in pencil with the butterfly and inscribed “imp”. Kennedy 155, first state (of ...

James McNeill Whistler (1830-1903), Lagoon: Noon, etching and drypoint, 1879-1880, signed with the butterfly and inscribed “imp” on the tab [also signed with the butterfly in the plate lower left]. Reference: Glasgow 209, third state (of 3), Kennedy 216, third state (of 3); Lochnan 231, 4 7/8 x 7 7/8 inches. A fine impression with very little plate tone, and printed with extraordinary attention to the etching and drypoint details. The printed butterfly, usually only barely visible, is clearly defined in this impression (see detail below). Kennedy mades special note that an impression like this, with the clearly visible butterfly, was in the collection of John H. Wrenn. On a commission from the Fine Arts Society, Whistler created the plates of his Venice series...

A superb impression from the artist's own collection. Etching with drypoint on watermarked FJ Head & Co. handmade laid paper, 10 3/4 x 9 7/8 inches (272 x 252 mm); sheet 18 1/8 x 14 ...

Whistler, James A. M. SAN BIAGIO. Etching and Drypoint, 1880. Glascow 237, K.197; M.194; W.163. State 8 of 17. With the printed butterfly at left, and with the butterfly signature in...