Queer Places:
United States Military Academy, West Point, New York, Stati Uniti
96 Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, London SW10 0DQ, Regno Unito
8 Fitzroy Square, Fitzrovia, London W1T 5HN, Regno Unito
Chiswick Old Cemetery, 22 Staveley Gardens, Chiswick, London W4 2SA, Regno Unito
James Abbott McNeill Whistler (July 10, 1834[1][2][3][4][5] –
July 17, 1903) was an American artist, active during the American Gilded Age
and based primarily in the United Kingdom. He was averse to sentimentality and
moral allusion in painting, and was a leading proponent of the credo "art for
art's sake". His famous signature for his paintings was in the shape of a
stylized butterfly possessing a long stinger for a tail.[6]
The symbol was apt, for it combined both aspects of his personality—his art
was characterized by a subtle delicacy, while his public persona was
combative. Finding a parallel between painting and music, Whistler entitled
many of his paintings "arrangements", "harmonies", and "nocturnes",
emphasizing the primacy of tonal harmony.[7]
His most famous painting is Arrangement in Grey and Black No. 1 (1871),
commonly known as Whistler's Mother, the revered and oft-parodied
portrait of motherhood. Whistler influenced the art world and the broader
culture of his time with his artistic theories and his friendships with
leading artists and writers.
Whistler had a distinctive appearance, short and slight, with piercing eyes
and a curling mustache, often sporting a monocle and the flashy attire of a
dandy.[118]
He affected a posture of self-confidence and eccentricity. He often was
arrogant and selfish toward friends and patrons. A constant self-promoter and
egoist, he relished shocking friends and enemies. Though he could be droll and
flippant about social and political matters, he always was serious about art
and often invited public controversy and debate to argue for his strongly held
theories.
Whistler had a high-pitched, drawling voice and a unique manner of speech,
full of calculated pauses. A friend said, "In a second you discover that he is
not conversing—he is sketching in words, giving impressions in sound and sense
to be interpreted by the hearer."[119]
Loie Fuller by James Abbott McNeill Whistler
Robert de Montesquiou by James McNeill Whistler
When a youthful John Singer Sargent
was first launching his career, some of his closest associates were very
flamboyant. Most conspicuous among them was
Robert
de Montesquiou - "the so-called "Prince of Decadence"" - whose incarnation
of dandified aestheticism was to Paris what
Oscar Wilde's was to London. Another
was Samuel Jean de Pozzi,
whose sexual exploits were almost as legendary as his pioneering work in the
field of gynecology; both aspects of his character were dashingly suggested in
Sargent's full-lenght portrait of 1881, Dr. Pozzi at Home. In the summer of
1885, Sargent have these friends (and the composer
Prince
Edmond de Polignac) a collective letter of introduction to
Henry James, who dutifully arranged a dinner
for them to meet James
Abbott McNeill Whistler for a chance to see the artist's fabled "Peacock
Room" in the home of Frederick
Richards Leyland, a shipping magnate whose house was at 49 Prince's Gate.
According to James, "on the whole nothing that relates to Whistler is queerer
than anything else." That all three Frenchmen would later resurface in the
masterwork A la recherche du temps perdu) of another gay writer,
Marcel Proust, makes the anterior
coincidence queerer still.
Whistler was well known for his biting wit, especially in exchanges with
his friend and rival Oscar
Wilde. Both were figures in the Café society of Paris, and they were often
the "talk of the town". They frequently appeared as caricatures in
Punch, to their mutual amusement. On one occasion, young Oscar Wilde
attended one of Whistler's dinners, and hearing his host make some brilliant
remark, apparently said, "I wish I'd said that", to which Whistler riposted,
"You will, Oscar, you will!" In fact, Wilde did repeat in public many
witticisms created by Whistler.
Their relationship soured by the mid-1880s, as Whistler turned against Wilde
and the Aesthetic Movement. When Wilde was publicly acknowledged to be a
homosexual in 1895, Whistler openly mocked him. Whistler reveled in preparing
and managing his social gatherings. As a guest observed:
One met all the best in Society there—the people with brains, and those
who had enough to appreciate them. Whistler was an inimitable host. He
loved to be the Sun round whom we lesser lights revolved…All came under
his influence, and in consequence no one was bored, no one dull.[120]
In Paris Whistler was friends with members of the Symbolist circle of
artists, writers and poets that included Stéphane Mallarmé[121]
and Marcel Schwob.[122]
Schwob had met Whistler in the mid-1890s through Stéphane Mallarmé they had
other mutual friends including Oscar Wilde (until they argued) and Whistler's
brother-in-law, Charles Whibley.
In addition to Henri Fantin-Latour, Alphonse Legros, and Courbet, Whistler
was friendly with many other French artists. He illustrated the book Les
Chauves-Souris with Antonio de La Gandara. He also knew the
Impressionists, notably Édouard Manet, Monet, and Edgar Degas. As a young
artist, he maintained a close friendship with
Dante
Gabriel Rossetti, a member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. His close
friendships with Monet and poet Stéphane Mallarmé, who translated the Ten
O'Clock Lecture into French, helped strengthen respect for Whistler by the
French public.[123]
Whistler was friendly with his fellow students at Gleyre's studio, including
Ignace Schott, whose son Leon Dabo Whistler later would mentor.
Whistler's lover and model for The White Girl, Joanna Hiffernan,
also posed for Gustave Courbet. Historians speculate that Courbet's erotic
painting of her as L'Origine du monde led to the breakup of the friendship
between Whistler and Courbet. During the 1870s and much of the 1880s, he lived
with his model-mistress Maud Franklin. Her ability to endure his long,
repetitive sittings helped Whistler develop his portrait skills.[120]
He not only made several excellent portraits of her but she was also a helpful
stand-in for other sitters.
In 1888, Whistler married Beatrice Godwin, (who was called 'Beatrix' or
'Trixie' by Whistler). She was the widow of the architect E. W. Godwin, who
had designed Whistler's White House. Beatrix was the daughter of the
sculptor John Birnie Philip[125]
and his wife Frances Black. Beatrix and her sisters Rosalind Birnie Philip[126]
and Ethel Whibley posed for many of Whistler's paintings and drawings; with
Ethel Whibley being the model for Mother of pearl and silver: The
Andalusian (1888–1900).[127]
The first five years of their marriage were very happy but her later life was
a time of misery for the couple, because of her illness and eventual death
from cancer. Near the end, she lay comatose much of the time, completely
subdued by morphine, given for pain relief. Her death was a strong blow
Whistler never quite overcame.[128]
Whistler had several illegitimate children, of whom Charles Hanson is the best
documented.[129]
After parting from his mistress Joanna Hiffernan, she helped to raise
Whistler's son, Charles James Whistler Hanson (1870–1935),[130]
the result of an affair with a parlour maid, Louisa Fanny Hanson.[127]
By his common law mistress Maud Franklin Whistler had two daughters: Ione
(born circa 1877) and Maud McNeill Whistler Franklin (born 1879).[131]
She sometimes referred to herself as 'Mrs. Whistler',
and in the census of 1881 gave her name as 'Mary M. Whistler'.
My published books:
BACK TO HOME PAGE
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Abbott_McNeill_Whistler
- Anesko, Michael. Henry James and Queer Filiation . Springer
International Publishing. Edizione del Kindle.