An illustrated study of American painter James Whistler.

Contrary to the myth which divorces modernist painting from literature, this new interpretation of Whistler shows that his art was profoundly influenced by it. The book also examines the nature of Whistler's modernity, his relationship with English and French painting, and throws new light on the famous libel trial with Ruskin. Forms part of Tate Publishing's British Artists series.

A fascinating look at the partnership of artist James McNeill Whistler and his chief model, Joanna Hiffernan, and the iconic works of art resulting from their life together “[A] lavish volume. . . . Illuminating. . . . MacDonald’s deep research has . . . unearthed important new facts.”—Gioia Diliberto, Wall Street Journal In 1860 James McNeill Whistler (1834–1903) and Joanna Hiffernan (1839–1886) met and began a significant professional and personal relationship. Hiffernan posed as a model for many of Whistler’s works, including his controversial Symphony in White paintings, a trilogy that fascinated and challenged viewers with its complex associations with sex and morality, class and fashion, academic and realist art, Victorian popular fiction, aestheticism and spiritualism. This luxuriously illustrated volume provides the first comprehensive account of Hiffernan’s partnership with Whistler throughout the 1860s and 1870s—a period when Whistler was forging a reputation as one of the most innovative and influential artists of his generation. A series of essays discusses how Hiffernan and Whistler overturned artistic conventions and sheds light on their interactions with contemporaries, including Gustave Courbet, for whom she also modeled. Packed with new insights into the creation, marketing, and cultural context of Whistler’s iconic works, this study also traces their resonance for his fellow artists, including Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Edgar Degas, John Singer Sargent, and Gustav Klimt.

Promised to Colby College in 2007, the Lunder Collection comprises more than 500 works of art, including paintings, sculptures, prints, and photographs. Special strengths of the collection include 19th- and 20th- century American art, as well as the Lunder-Colville Collection of Chinese Art and more than 300 works by James McNeill Whistler. The Lunder Collection: A Gift of Art to Colby College is a richly illustrated volume featuring more than 265 collection highlights. Conceived as the companion to the 2009 publication Art at Colby: Celebrating the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Colby College Museum of Art, the catalogue includes seven essays on the collection’s major areas, The Lunder Colville-Chinese Art Collection, Art through the American Centennial, the art of James McNeill Whistler, art of the Gilded Age, art of the American West, American Modernism, and art after 1945, as well as seventeen reflections on specific works or groups of work in the collection. Selected contributors include Elizabeth Broun, Barbara Haskell, Erica Hirshler, Virginia Mecklenburg, Kenneth Myers, Martha Tedeschi, Thayer Tolles, William Truettner, and Adam Weinberg.

Examines both the life and work of the nineteenth-century painter, dispelling the usual portrait of an irascible dandy at war with critics and other artists, and assesses his reputation as a pivotal figure in the arts and his influence on the work of fellow artists. Reprint.

‘A captivating tale ...This novel is a delight’ THE TIMES ‘A terrific novel ... It springs off the page’ DEBORAH MOGGACH 'Vividly engaging’ SUNDAY TIMES