A Street at Saverne

1. Glazer, Jacobson, McCarthy, Roeder, wall label, 2019:
After unsuccessful stints at the US Military Academy at West Point and at the US Coast and Geodetic Survey here in Washington, Whistler moved to Paris to become an artist. In 1858 he and fellow artist Ernest Delannoy started on a walking tour of the Alsace and Rhineland regions, planning to reach Amsterdam. They soon abandoned the trip when they ran out of money. Along the way Whistler made scores of pencil drawings and several watercolors. He also drew on prepared copperplates that he etched and printed in Paris. The etchings here formed part of his first series, Twelve Etchings after Nature, known as the French Set. With under- and overdrawing in pencil, the watercolors were intended as compositional studies structured by line rather than color, while the etchings were considered finished works of art.

2. Lee Glazer, 2017:
This work, like F1898.152, F1898.153, and F1898.156 is a significant example of Whistler's early use of watercolor as a preparatory medium. Although his approach to watercolor changed markedly when he took it up again in the 1880s, Whistler's peripatetic quest for subjects and his interest in old city views endured throughout his career.

3. Kenneth Myers, wall label, 2004:
Saverne, or Zabern, is in Alsace, on the border between France and Germany, about thirty miles northwest of Strasbourg. Whistler and Delannoy stayed in Saverne for several days soon after they left Paris, long enough for Whistler to complete this elaborate watercolor. The watercolor served as the model for the etching A Street at Saverne.