‘Arrangement in Yellow and Gray’: Effie Deans

Whistler here connected painting with music and literature, alluded to by the title of this piece. He used the musical term ‘arrangement’ to draw attention to the composition of colours. Later on, he added the literary subtitle ‘Effie Deans’ after the heroine of a novel by the Scottish writer Walter Scott. The model posing for Whistler in this painting is Maud Franklin, who worked with him for more than fifteen years.