The Doorway

James McNeill Whistler

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Richly ornamented panels surround a central void and invite us into the shadowed interior of the Palazzo Gussoni, with a sunlit courtyard glimpsed beyond. This etching belongs to Whistler’s "First Venice Set," and the artist found his subject on the Rio de la Fava canal, east of the Rialto. The dark interior space seems dappled with reflected light shining through a grid that fills the central arch. Close inspection, however, reveals the shapes to be chairs hanging from the ceiling. Whistler undoubtedly planned this coincidence of patterning and avoided clarifying the details. His interest in shifting light led him to devote one-third of the sheet to the foreground canal, where subtly manipulated plate tone contrasts suggested depth with reflected surface.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.

Metropolitan Museum of Art