History begins in the moonlit silence of Landscape with Drawbridge and Ruin in Moonlight, where the bridge is a heavy, wooden relic of a forgotten age. We see the rigid stone weight in A View of the Inside of the New Prison at Rome and the classical order of La libreria. V.. Before the iron age, we find the rhythmic celebrations of The "Giovedì Grasso" Festival before the Ducal Palace in Venice and the naval majesty of A Dutch Hulk and a Boeier from The Sailing Vessels. The world was once a sprawling, ordered map like Gezicht op Hampton Court. But the air changes. In the heat of The Forge, the iron is beaten into a new shape. We cross the Bridge at Caracas and find ourselves in the bustling industrial noise of Steamboats in the Port of Rouen and Port of Rouen, Unloading Wood. The landscape is no longer pure nature, as seen in Landscape with Smokestacks, but a hybrid of soot and sky. Even the spiritual retreats, like The Interior of the Jacobskirche at Innsbruck, or the opulent Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room, cannot hide the shifting tide of the exterior world. The 'Iron Lace' begins to span the rivers. The Railway Bridge at Argenteuil cuts through the Impressionist light, a skeletal promise of speed. We see it in the hazy London atmosphere of Waterloo Bridge, Sunlight Effect, Charing Cross Bridge, and the gothic majesty of Houses of Parliament, London. Whistler captures this transition in the mist of Grey and Silver: Chelsea Wharf, The Anchorage, and the aerial perspective of Isle de la Cité, Paris. In Paris, the transformation is absolute. The Eiffel Tower rises, captured by Rousseau in The Eiffel Tower and Seine and Eiffel Tower in the Sunset, a permanent filigree against the clouds. Yet, the old narrow paths like Passage des Deux-Soeurs de la rue Lafayette remain. We move through the theatrical elegance of La Samaritaine and the monumental engineering of At the Bottom of Gatun Lock. Finally, we find the human spirit inhabiting these structures. Young Man at His Window looks out onto the iron-ordered streets. We see the hustle in Trinity Church and Wall Street and the abstract connection in The People and the Bridge. The journey moves from the Gondola Moorings on the Grand Canal to the modern, fog-drenched silence of the Golden Gate. The iron lace has become our second nature.
