Whistler, James Abbott McNeill (1834-1903), was a famous American artist. He spent most of his life in Europe. Whistler’s paintings, flamboyant manner, clever wit, and quarrelsome nature made him an international celebrity. His best-known painting is Arrangement in Gray and Black No. 1: Portrait of the Artist’s Mother (1872), commonly called Whistler’s Mother. Its flattened forms, monochrome (single-color) tone, and unsymmetrical composition are characteristic of Whistler’s style. He was influenced by Japanese artists who used similar techniques in woodcuts.
Whistler named many of his paintings for types of musical compositions, such as nocturnes and symphonies. He believed paintings, like music, should be abstract. They should not describe objects or tell stories, but respond to the imagination of the artist. Whistler also felt forms in a painting are more important than the subject.
The English art critic John Ruskin criticized one of Whistler’s most abstract paintings, Nocturne in Black and Gold—The Falling Rocket (about 1874). Ruskin declared that Whistler had flung “a pot of paint in the public’s face.” Whistler sued Ruskin for libel and defended his theories on art in court. He won the case but got less than a penny in damages. The cost of the lawsuit forced him into bankruptcy. But it gave desirable publicity to his belief that art should be created for its own sake rather than for a moral purpose. Whistler included excerpts from his defense in a book of his collected writings, The Gentle Art of Making Enemies (1890).
In addition to his paintings, Whistler became well known for his prints and interior decorations. Whistler created about 440 etchings, including many illustrations of Venice and the River Thames. The most famous example of Whistler’s interior decoration is the Peacock Room, which he designed for a house in London. The room is now in the Freer Gallery in Washington, D.C.
Whistler was born on July 11, 1834, in Lowell, Massachusetts. In 1843, he moved with his family to St. Petersburg, Russia, where his father directed the construction of a railroad. He returned to the United States in 1849. In 1851, Whistler entered the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He was expelled three years later for academic reasons. From November 1854 to February 1855, Whistler worked as a chartmaker for the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, where he received fine training in the technique of etching. In 1855, Whistler went to Paris to study art. He moved to London in 1859 and spent most of the rest of his life there. He died on July 17, 1903.
