System Number: 03204
Date: [3 April 1894][1]
Author: JW
Place: Paris
Recipient: Alexander Reid[2]
Place: Glasgow
Repository: Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Call Number: FGA Whistler 238
Credit Line: Charles Lang Freer Papers, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.: Gift of the Estate of Charles Lang Freer
Document Type: ALS[3]
110 Rue du Bac - Paris -
Dear Mr Reid -
Your letter[4] is certainly most interesting -
I have thought over your proposal - & may say at once that of course, if anything come [sic] of it all, I agree to the ten per cent commission -
It is no slight matter this journey due north! - First however I must know much more about it -
Are the portraits in question men? woman? or children? -
[p. 2] Fair? dark? old? or young? -
A studio would have to be found for me - I mean really a studio - in which judging from what you know of my own: you could be sure that I would find sufficient height as well as pleasant light -
This you might perhaps manage to borrow from some one who at the time might be going away -
Here we come to the question of time -
I have work here for the end of this month - Perhaps somewhere in May - might be thought of - No - that wont do -
It must be later -
However all that can be thought out afterwards -
Now about prices -
You say that the large work can be better paid for than the smaller pictures -
But the smaller paintings give quite as much trouble if not more -
Well I don't know - Why should it not be arranged for the people to come half way - [p. 3] A studio might be found for me in London -
Still that does not seem to me to be much wiser -
Well let me hear more - and then we shall see -
Very Sincerely
J McN Whistler
This document is protected by copyright.
Envelope:
'S + E'
Alexander Reid - Esq -Société des Beaux Arts -
227. West George Street -
Glasgow -
Écosse
[stamp, illegible]
[postmark:] PARIS - 17 / R. DES HALLES / 7E 3 / AVRIL / 94
[postmark on verso, illegible]
Notes:
1. [3 April 1894]
Dated from postmark.
2. Alexander Reid
Alexander Reid (1854-1936), Glasgow dealer [more].
3. ALS
A copy of this letter in the hand of Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958), JW's sister-in-law [more], is at Whistler LB 4/44/2-45.