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Anecdotes Of Whistler

Anecdotes Of Whistler image
Parent Issue
Day
7
Month
August
Year
1903
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

ANECDOTES OF WHISTLER

Late Artist's Treatment of a Sitter Who Annoyed Him.

It is told of the late James McNeill Whistler that upon a certain occasion he appeared at a dinner party with no tie on, says Harper's Weekly. A friend of his remonstrated.

"For heaven's sake, Whistler, you've forgotten your tie!"

"Not at all," he returned, "not at all! Why wear a tie? My white collar rises from my white shirt, which is fastened by a gold stud. Everything simple, excellent. Why put another white on top of that? I'm much better dressed than you?"

Whistler was unsparing to sitters who annoyed him – in fact, a sitting with him was an ordeal that it required courage to face. It is said that one man annoyed him horribly by saying at the end of each sitting:

"How about that ear, Mr. Whistler? Don't forget to finish that!"

At the last sitting, everything being done except this ear, Whistler said:

"Well, I think I am through. Now I'll sign it," which he did in a very solemn, important manner, as was his way.

"But my ear, Mr. Whistler! You aren't going to leave it that way?"

"Oh, you can put it in after you get home!"

Whistler's laxity in the matter of engagements was notorious. No one even knew if he were coming or not to affairs. But his point of view is explained in his answer to a friend of his who knew that he had an engagement to dine with some swells in a distant part of London and who felt that it was most impolitic for Whistler to offend them. It was growing late, and yet Whistler was painting away, madly intently.

"My dear fellow," he said to him at last, "it is frightfully late, and you have to dine with Lady Such-a-One. Don't you think you'd better stop?"

"Stop!" fairly shrieked Whistler. "Stop, when everything is going so beautifully? Go and stuff myself with disgusting food when I can paint like this? Never! Never! Besides, they won't do anything until I get there – they never do!" And the entire speech is most characteristic of the man.