James McNeill Whistler The Sea, Brittany

Date Summer 1888
Materials Oil on wood
Dimensions 8.2 cm x 14.0 cm
Marks Signed with a butterfly at the bottom right
Further information GLAHA 46340.
Andrew McLaren Young, Margaret F. MacDonald, Robin Spencer and Hamish Miles, The Paintings of James McNeill Whistler, New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1980 (381, plate 241).

Note This tiny panel was painted during Whistler’s honeymoon in Brittany in France. Although it was painted with a fine brush, the small scale of the panel gives the effect of broad brushstrokes. Whistler thinned down his oil paint and used it in a similar way to watercolour. The sea was painted with long, fluid strokes of the brush. The lines left by the brush economically suggest the movement of the tide. The sky is more complex. Look how Whistler added swirls of yellow, purple and green to create a sky full of colour and vigour, and one that contrasts well with the rich, dark blue of the sea. The boats, which appear silhouetted on the horizon line, are painted with very simple but effective dabs of dark pigment.