Longshore Men

James McNeill Whistler

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

When Whistler moved to London from Paris in 1859 he found lodgings in a wharf district below Tower Bridge. Commercial activity along the Thames, whose banks were densely lined with warehouses, became a frequent source of inspiration with this image centered on figures in a pub or "ordinary" (cheap restaurant) seated around long wooden tables. Longshore men did a variety of jobs along the river, most often unloading goods from ships and barges. The Met's two other impressions of this print are 83.1.20 and 17.21.72.

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