The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of July 9, 2025

The Garden

1879–80
(American, 1834–1903)
Catalogue raisonné: Kennedy 210; MacDonald 194
Location: not on view

Did You Know?

This print is among the only ones in James McNeill Whistler's Second Venice Set without a clearly identifiable setting.

Description

Part of an expatriate community in Venice, James McNeill Whistler focused on the city’s architectural details in the prints, drawings, and paintings that he made during a year spent living there. This etching presents a private garden from the perspective of one of the city’s distinctive canals. Seen through an open doorway, the view, offers a voyeuristic glimpse of its inhabitants’ lives. Situated outside and looking into a lush garden, the viewer is placed in the artist’s position, able to feel his excitement as an outsider exploring a new but historied place.
  • ?-1923
    Mr. and Mrs. Ralph King, Cleveland, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
    1923-
    Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Webb, Sheila, and Cleveland Museum of Art. Paper, the Continuous Thread. Cleveland, OH: Published by the Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1982. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 49-50, no. 42; Mentioned: p. 68
  • Stories from Storage. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 7-May 16, 2021).
    Paper: The Continuous Thread. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 31-October 24, 1982).
    Etchings and Lithographs by Whistler: Gifts and Loans of Mr. and Mrs. Ralph King. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 17-April 2, 1923).
  • {{cite web|title=The Garden|url=false|author=James McNeill Whistler|year=1879–80|access-date=09 July 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1923.31