Elinor Leyland

Elinor Leyland

Dundee Art Galleries & Museum:272-1987-337

Artist: Whistler, James Abbott McNeill

Date: 1874

State: 4/8

Size: 21.3 x 14.0 cm

Medium: Drypoint

Details Drypoint. Black ink on laid paper. Butterfly on right and signature ‘Whistler’ in remarque bottom right. Over 30 impressions are known.
Description Detailed information concerning the Whistler prints held in The Orchar Collection comes from the University of Glasgow’s excellent Whistler Etchings Project. (Margaret F. MacDonald, Grischka Petri, Meg Hausberg, and Joanna Meacock, James McNeill Whistler: The Etchings, a catalogue raisonné, University of Glasgow, 2012, on-line website at http://etchings.arts.gla.ac.uk). Considerable thanks are due to Professor MacDonald for allowing us to use their research in these entries.

Elinor (1861-1952) was the youngest daughter of Frederick Richards Leyland and Frances (née Dawson). Leyland had four children; Elinor, Frederick Dawson, Fanny and Florence. Whistler made portrait of all four children but Elinor was his favourite. He painted and sketched her on numerous occasions.

The Dundee jute baron Sir James Key Caird (1837-1916) had links with both Leyland and Whistler. Indeed Sir James’s wife, Sophie, was the sister of Lady Effie Gray who married the critic John Ruskin and then the artist Sir John Everett Millais. Whistler was invited, late in 1894, to visit the family at their Dundee home at 8 Roseangle but it seems unlikely Whistler ever visited the city. Glasgow University Library MS Whistler C2, The Correspondence of James McNeill Whistler, 1855-1903, edited by Margaret F. MacDonald, Patricia de Montfort and Nigel Thorp; including The Correspondence of Anna McNeill Whistler, 1855-1880, edited by Georgia Toutziari. On-line edition, University of Glasgow. http://www.whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk/correspondence
Catalogue Entry
  1. Edward G. Kennedy, The Etched Work of Whistler. New York, Grolier Club, 1910 (109)
  2. Howard Mansfield, A Descriptive Catalogue of the Etchings and Dry-Points of James Abbott McNeill Whistler. Chicago, Caxton Club, 1909 (108)
  3. Ralph Thomas, A Catalogue of the Etchings and Drypoints of J.A M. Whistler. London, John Russell Smith, 1874 (78)
  4. Sir Frederick Wedmore, Whistler’s Etchings: a Study and a Catalogue. London, Thibaudeau, 1886 (95)
  5. Whistler Etchings Project (137)
Other Collections (UK)
  1. British Museum, Department of Prints and Drawings, London
  2. Glasgow Museums, Glasgow
  3. Hunterian Art Gallery Collections, University of Glasgow, Glasgow
  4. Victoria and Albert Museum: Print Collection, London
  5. Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool
  6. Worcester Art Museum, Worcester

See the Whistler Etchings Project for a list of impressions.
References
  1. Emmanuel Bénézit, Dictionary of Artists. Paris, Gründ, 2006
  2. Rodney K. Engen, Dictionary of Victorian Engravers, Print Publishers and Their Works. Cambridge, Chadwyck-Heley, 1979
  3. Kenneth M. Guichard, British Etchers 1850-1940. London, Robin Garton Ltd., 1977
  4. Katharine A. Lochnan, The Etchings of James McNeill Whistler. New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1984
  5. Margaret F. MacDonald, James McNeill Whistler. Drawings, Pastels and Watercolours. A Catalogue Raisonné. New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1995
  6. William Rough, ‘A cluster of butterflies: James Guthrie Orchar and his collection of Whistler etchings and drypoints’, Journal of the Scottish Society for Art History, Volume 16, 2011-12

 

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