System Number: 00042
Date: [16 October 1899][1]
Author: JW
Place: Dieppe
Recipient: Inez Addams[2]
Place: Paris
Repository: Glasgow University Library
Call Number: MS Whistler A42
Document Type: ALS[3]
RESTAURANT A LEFÈVRE.
1. RUE DE L'HÔTEL DE VILLE.
DIEPPE.
I reappear[4] upon the surface - for a moment only! - coming up, from mysterious depths, close to the same coast! -
This only that the anxious Apprentice may at once communicate from the camp, and recieve [sic] reply from Headquarters - -
The truth is everything must be in excellent trim round and about the Apprentice Massière, [p. 2] for the last instructions, I fancy, cover all possible contingencies - and now one or two things occur to me for the moment -
1st. You may announce my visit for the Friday of this coming week -
So that is settled -
And I think that you might see Mr Crawford[5] and impart to him, that as an especial consideration - now that he has conformed to the rule - he is to go into the Atelier at once - and I shall expect to find him in his place on my return -
I dont know that anything more need be said to any one -
Excepting always Carmen[6], to whom you might charmingly say that everything is as it should be - and that this post would have brought her a letter to reassure her, if the time had not escaped me! -
It would be nice of her if she would look over the Studio for me and get it all well in order -
I want you to write to me tomorrow - I am here in the hotel - with the best restaurant out of Paris! -
I want to hear of your own work - and of the people you have [p. 3] seen -
What I have allowed to keep me away from Paris in this really cruel sun you may wonder - But I have been occupied with some most extraordinary problems! - & I think . . . . I have solved them -
J McN Whistler
This document is protected by copyright.
Envelope:
àMademoiselle Inez Bate -
9. Rue des Fourneaux
Paris -
[stamp:] POSTE / 15 / REPUBLIQUE FRANCAISE
[postmark:] DIEPPE / SEINE INFRE / 10E 16 / OCT / 99
[postmark on verso:] [8 PARIS] 8 / [DIS]TRIBUTION / [...] 17 / OCT / 99
[on verso:] Don't write - as may leave -
Notes:
1. [16 October 1899]
Dated from postmark.
2. Inez Addams
Inez Eleanor Addams (fl. 1898-1927), née Bate, painter [more]. This letter relates to the Academie Carmen, the Paris atelier opened by Carmen Rossi where JW taught occasionally from 1898-1901. Addams was one of its first students. She became legally articled to JW as an apprentice on 20 July 1899 (see indentureship, #00019) and also acted as studio massière. See also JW to I. Addams, #00037, #00038, #00039).
3. ALS
There is a mourning border on the envelope only.
4. reappear
JW had been painting and recovering from an illness at Pourville-sur-Mer in Northern France between July and the end of October 1899 although, in between times, he seems to have made various excursions to London, Paris and Holland. He was back by 26 October and would have presumably visited the Académie, as promised, on Friday 27 October.
5. Mr Crawford
Earl Stetson Crawford (1877-1934), art student at the Académie Carmen [more].
6. Carmen
Carmen Rossi, model, proprietess of the Académie Carmen [more].