Show STUDENT LIFE 3G Ills mother a descendant of an old Scottish family bearing the name of McXcill was a woman of high purpose strong character and influence a upon who exerted great her son When the boy was still very young his father was called to Russia to help construct a railroad and accordingly the whole family went After his father's death abroad which occurred there some years’ later he returned to his old home and was placed hv the wishes of his father’s friends in a school to prepare for West Point Later lie entered that academy much to his own dislike The work and discipline were very distasteful to him so he finally dropped out going abroad to take up the study of art There is a story to the effect that Whistler was sent out one day to make a drawing for the United States coast survey After he had completed the task he amused himself by sketching on the margin When the coast drawing was printed the sketches were noticed and he was severely reprimanded by his The sketches were so superiors betterthan the mechanical much exercise that he decided on an artistic career and shortly afterwards left for Paris There he entered the studio of Gleyre where he remained for a time Of the influence of that academic master however his work shows not the slightest trace rather the reverse There is one quality at least which the academicians have possessed they have awakened in - the freer more independent spirits that mood of rebellion and of so essential to individual development The art Whistler has left behind him is a product of a fine and most delicate selection an intermingling of many qualities lie has taken something from Velasquez from Rossetti from the Impressionists The digand from the Japanese nity of the grand line and the majesty and refinement of black and grey tones he learned from VelasIn the figures of Rossetti quez with their trancelike intensity he found a quality akin to his own From spirituality of sentiment the Impressionists he took their delicate discriminations of values the rendering of the effect of form by chromatic tones of color harmonized in the medium of natural light instead of the golden atmospheres created by the old masters Through the Japanese he learned the fantastic balancing of irregular forms and spaces with continual subtle surprise of detail and the arbitrary choice of a point of view viewing a scene for instance from a point higher or lower than one would ordinarily expect to see it fie found there also which appealed to him harmonies of tender or sparkling sprightliness All these different threads of motive after they had been transfused through his own rarely gifted personality coupled with qualities distinctly his own were woven into a beautiful fabric embodying his own creation a fabric which in its self-discove- ry |