System Number: 01105
Date: 14 January 1880[1]
Author: Marcus Bourne Huish[2]
Place: London
Recipient: JW
Place: [Venice]
Repository: Glasgow University Library
Call Number: MS Whistler F36
Document Type: ALS
THE FINE ART SOCIETY,
148, NEW BOND ST. W.
London
14th Jan: 1880.
Dear Mr Whistler
We have been day after day, & week after week, expecting to have tidings of you - but all that we have had have been vague reports at second hand -
The success of the Venice set[3] will be seriously marred if they do not very soon appear as many [p. 2] men who we had been getting up to fever heat are cooling down - & once the winter is over away goes our chance of selling etchings until next [wi?] autumn. Mr Howell[4] was in here yesterday with a report that you were now engaged upon a very big etching[5] & not on the set - How is this?
[p. 3] No doubt the winter has been dead against you but still we ought to be hearing something for if you remember the time was postponed from November until December so as to give you ample time. So I trust that for all our sakes we shall not be long without some tangible news of you in the shape of the plates.
Believe me to remain
very truly yours
Marcus B Huish
This document is protected by copyright.
Notes:
1. 14 January 1880
JW probably arrived in Venice on 20 September 1879, and was not back in London until November 1880.
2. Marcus Bourne Huish
Marcus Bourne Huish (1843 - d.1921), barrister, writer and art dealer, Director of the Fine Art Society [more].
3. Venice set
The first set of twelve etchings, Mr Whistler's Etchings of Venice, 1880 (the first 'Venice Set') (K. 183-189, 191-195). (excat 5), was published by the Fine Art Society in 1880.
4. Mr Howell
Charles Augustus ('Owl') Howell (1840? - d.1890), entrepreneur [more].
5. big etching
JW believed etchings should be small, to be consistent with the fine point of the etching needle, see his reply to Huish, #02992.