Wapping

Whistler took rooms in Rotherhithe on the south bank of the Thames in 1860, down among the docks, and painted the far shore. The title names that far shore, Wapping, while the balcony he worked from is on the Rotherhithe side looking across at it. Behind the three figures the water is thick with masts and rigging, which is what the river looked like there before the docks emptied. He signed and dated the canvas 1861 and then kept at it for another three years. Early in 1861 he wrote to his friend the painter Fantin-Latour in Paris that the thing would be a masterpiece, and mentioned that he had already repainted the woman's head three times without getting the expression he was after. The woman is Joanna Hiffernan, his model and his companion. The Royal Academy finally showed the picture in 1864.