[Whistler seated with Mortimer Menpes standing. Whistler wears the much talked about coat wth cape and curly brimmed hat]

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Whistler sits while the Australian-born painter Mortimer Menpes stands beside him, and the picture records the costume that made Whistler instantly recognizable in London: a long coat with a cape and a hat with a curled brim. Menpes, a painter and etcher who worked closely with Whistler in the 1880s, later published his own memoir of the older artist, so the photograph documents one of the relationships that shaped how Whistler's life was remembered. The print comes from the Joseph and Elizabeth Robins Pennell collection, assembled by two writers who wrote extensively about Whistler and helped preserve material about his career.

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