stylistic:style_transfer, stylistic:tone, linguistic:translation
London

Reflecting his adopted circle's banner of the Realism art movement, Whistler painted his first exhibited work, La Mère Gérard in 1858. He followed it by painting At the Piano in 1859 in London, which he adopted as his home, while also regularly visiting friends in France. At the Piano is a portrait composed of his niece and her mother in their London music room, an effort which clearly displayed his talent and promise. A critic wrote, " a recklessly bold manner and sketchiness of the wildest and roughest kind, a genuine feeling for colour and a splendid power of composition and design, which evince a just appreciation of nature very rare amongst artists." The work is unsentimental and effectively contrasts the mother in black and the daughter in white, with other colors kept restrained in the manner advised by his teacher Gleyre. It was displayed at the Royal Academy the following year, and in many exhibits to come.

In a second painting executed in the same room, Whistler demonstrated his natural inclination toward innovation and novelty by fashioning a genre scene with unusual composition and foreshortening. It later was re-titled Harmony in Green and Rose: The Music Room. This painting also demonstrated Whistler's ongoing work pattern, especially with portraits: a quick start, major adjustments, a period of neglect, then a final flurry to the finish.

After a year in London, he produced a set of etchings in 1860 called Thames Set, as counterpoint to his 1858 French set, as well as some early impressionistic work including The Thames in Ice. At this stage, he was beginning to establish his technique of tonal harmony based on a limited, predetermined palette.