Skip to main content
Collections Menu
(American, 1834–1903)

Fishing Boat

1879–80
Etching and drypoint on cream laid paper
Plate: 6 1/16 x 9 in. (15.4 x 22.9 cm)
Mat: 16 x 20 in. (40.6 x 50.8 cm)
Credit LineTerra Foundation for American Art, Daniel J. Terra Collection
Object number1992.150
SignedSigned in graphite tab, lower left, with butterfly monogram and "imp"
Interpretation
James McNeill Whistler's etching Fishing Boat shows a single vessel, its sails furled, moored in a waterway. Beneath fishing nets hung to dry in the sunlight, a lone fisherman sits shaded by a tarp. The outlined dome of Santa Maria della Salute is faintly visible in the far right background. Instead of the famous church's remarkable architecture, Whistler focused on the compositional and other formal possibilities created by his head-on view of the long side of this ordinary boat. Vessels of many kinds abound in Venice's canals and lagoon as an essential means of transportation, shipping, and procuring food from the sea. Whistler showed the same type of fishing boat featured in this print moored along one of Venice's busiest embankments, in The Riva, No. 1 (TF 1992.156), and made boats the subject of another etching, Shipping, Venice (TF 1992.159).

Whistler deemed this typical subject from everyday life a suitably picturesque one for his series of Venice etchings, which had been commissioned by the Fine Art Society, a London gallery. Such modest subjects confounded the artist's English critics, who expected him to create pictures of Venice's grand landmarks and the celebrated vistas that have attracted centuries of tourists. Whistler instead presented a Venice that was intimate and everyday, affording a rare insider's impression of the city's moods as well as its architecture.
ProvenanceThe artist
Heinrich Stinnes
Davis & Langdale Company, Inc., New York, New York
Daniel J. Terra Collection, Chicago, Illinois, 1985
Terra Foundation for the Arts Collection, Chicago, Illinois, 1992

Exhibition History
King's Lynn, no. 26.

Arts Council, no. 32.

An American Revelation: The Daniel J. Terra Collection, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, February 28–October 1, 1988.

Regard sur James Abbott McNeill Whistler (James Abbott McNeill Whistler at a Glance), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–October 30, 1994 (on exhibit partial run: September 20–October 30, 1994).

American Treasures: Chase, Whistler, and the Prendergasts, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, April 26, 1996–January 5, 1997.

On Process: The American Print, Technique Examined, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, January 13–March 2, 2001.
Published References
Kennedy, Edward Guthrie. The Etched Work of Whistler. Illustrated by reproductions in collotype of the different states of the plates. New York: Grolier Club, 1910. No. 208 iii/v.

Fine, Ruth E. Drawing Near: Whistler Etchings from the Zelman Collection. (exh. cat., Los Angeles County Museum of Art). Los Angeles, California: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1984. No. 64, pp. 140–41.

Lochnan, Katharine A. The Etchings of James McNeill Whistler. New Haven, Connecticut and London, England: Art Gallery of Ontario and Yale University Press, 1984. No. 216.

Grieve, Alastair. Whistler's Venice. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 2000. Text pp. 138, 139, 192; fig. 171.

MacDonald, Margaret F. Palaces in the Night: Whistler in Venice. Hampshire, England: Lund Humphries, 2001. Text pp. 68, 120.
Maud, Standing
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
c. 1873
Grey and Silver: The Golf Links, Dublin
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
1900
Rose et Vert, l'Iris: Portrait of Miss Kinsella
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
begun 1894
Metadata embedded, 2021
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
c. 1873
Metadata Embedded, 2019
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
c. 1901
2019 Photography Metadata Embedded
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
1881
Metadata embedded, 2021
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
1879–80
Metadata embedded, 2021
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
c. 1893
2020 metadata embedded
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
c. 1887
A Chelsea Shop
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
c. 1894–95
2019 Photography Metadata Embedded
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
1879–80
Metadata EMBEDDED, 2021
James Abbott McNeill Whistler
1879–80