Documents associated with: Winter Exhibition, Royal Society of British Artists, London, 1887-1888
Record 4 of 30
System Number: 06086
Date: 5 September 1887
Author: Thomas Robert Way[1]
Place: London
Recipient: JW
Place: [London]
Repository: Glasgow University Library
Call Number: MS Whistler W83
Document Type: ALS[2]
21, WELLINGTON STREET, STRAND, W. C.
LONDON,
Septr 5 1887.
Dear Mr Whistler
Enclosed is one of the blocks[3] for you to try. I hope it will prove satisfactory.
I have also enclosed a small parcel of 3 chalks[4] to be used on this paper. They are extremely hard and brittle, but they have the advantage of not thickening when transferred to stone, as all the other chalks will do from the pressure put upon them and the moisture used. I expect you [p. 2] will get used to them with the rapidity with which you master everything you touch - they are made expressly for this work. You will be sorry to hear that my father[5] is not at all well just now, so much so as to be unable to attend to business.
May I ask you to be kind enough to let us have the two pastels back[,] the very beautiful one which you hung lately in Suffolk St[6] and the figure on the balcony[7] with the white mount? We all miss them so much especially the former. I shall post you proofs of the cover[8] in the morning
[p. 3] with kind regards
your's very sincerely
Tom. R. Way
This document is protected by copyright.
Notes:
1. Thomas Robert Way
Thomas Robert Way (1861-1913), printer, lithographer and painter [more]. His father had taught JW the principles of lithography in 1878.
2. ALS
This letter was published in Spink, Nesta R., The Lithographs of James McNeill Whistler, gen. eds Harriet K. Stratis and Martha Tedeschi, Chicago, 1998, vol. 2, p. 43, no. 18.
3. blocks
A limestone block on which to draw a lithograph. JW took up lithography again in 1887.
4. 3 chalks
Lithographic chalks.
5. my father
Thomas Way (1837-1915), lithographic printer [more].
6. one which you hung lately in Suffolk St
Note in Violet and Green (M.1074).
7. figure on the balcony
Annabel Lee (M.1077).
8. proofs of the cover
Possibly of Whistler, James McNeill, Mr. Whistler's 'Ten O'clock', London, 1888 (see also #06087).