Weary

James McNeill Whistler

Drypoint on Japanese paper

British Museum

Weary (1863) is a drypoint print by James McNeill Whistler depicting his model and companion Joanna Hiffernan reclining in an enveloping chair, her hair loose, her eyes averted, her body still in a moment of quiet repose. Whistler scratched lines directly into a copper plate to produce the image, exploiting the soft, velvety burr characteristic of drypoint to render Hiffernan's face and hair with delicate, sfumato-like modelling, while the lower portion of the composition dissolves into spare, open white space. Born in Lowell, Massachusetts in 1834, Whistler became one of the foremost printmakers of the nineteenth century, working primarily in London and Paris and championing the Aesthetic Movement's doctrine of art for art's sake. Weary exists in six states and was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1863, and later in Whistler's own solo exhibition of 1874, establishing it as one of the most admired drypoints of his career.