Music was an important source of inspiration for Whistler. He gave many of his paintings titles borrowed from the world of music, using words like ‘composition’, ‘symphony’ and ‘harmony’.
He said:
‘As music is the poetry of sound, so is painting the poetry of sight, and the subject-matter has nothing to do with harmony of sound or of colour.’
Whistler thought that painting and music were similar. Music is the poetry of sound. Painting is the poetry of what you see. He believed the subject of a painting was less important than the colours and the harmony of the work as a whole.