Harmony in Blue and Pearl: The Sands, Dieppe

Early in 1885 Whistler stood up in London to give a lecture people still quote, the Ten O'Clock, arguing that a painting should work the way music does, arranging tone and colour rather than telling a story. That autumn he was on the beach at Dieppe, then a fashionable French resort busy with Parisian and English visitors, and this upright little panel is that idea put to work. He called it a harmony in blue and pearl. The sea is a pale blue, the sky is streaked with soft grey, and the bathers are set down in a few quick strokes, some paddling at the edge, a few sailing boats further out. The paint is thin and creamy, brushed on fast. Whistler first hoped to sell it for 60 pounds and finally let it go for 30.