James McNeill Whistler

Frame of Nocturne

Date c. 1875-1877
Materials
Dimensions
Marks Signed with a butterfly at the centre right.
Further information GLAHA 46361.

Note Whistler not only painted Nocturne, but designed the frame that it hung in. Whistler’s frames were much more simple than the typical fancy Victorian frame. This frame was decorated with a Japanese-inspired fish-scale pattern. Most of Whistler’s frames were inspired by Japanese designs and they were often based on simple geometric shapes. For this frame he used blue paint to enhance the colours in his painting, and then signed the frame as well as the picture. This was very unusual and suggested that he considered his frames to be equally important to his paintings.