“Music in the Tuileries” by Édouard Manet

“Music in the Tuileries” by Édouard Manet depicts the gathering of a fashionable and wealthy crowd that includes many artists and intellectuals that gathered in the Tuileries Gardens to listen to one of the twice-weekly concerts given there.

Manet has included several of his friends, artists, authors, and musicians who take part, and a self-portrait. He is a participant in the scene but slightly detached from it.

Manet is the man standing at the far left of the picture holding a cane. His body is cut by the edge of the canvas and partly obscured by the man next to him. For Manet, it was also a group portrait of Manet and his family, friends, and associates.

No musicians are visible, but the picture title allows the viewer to imagine the music and conversation.

Some critics regarded the painting as unfinished, but the atmosphere imparts a sense of what the Tuileries Gardens was like at the time.

When exhibited in 1863 with its lack of polish and its bold brushwork, it infuriated the critics.

This painting is Manet’s first real attempt at capturing contemporary urban life. The picture has been described as the earliest example of modern art due to its subject matter and technique.

The colors in the lower areas of the gardens are generally subdued and executed in ochres. The dark green foliage in the upper part contains a glaze of emerald green and green mixed with yellow lake with the small additions of ivory black and yellow ochre.

The prominent, colorful accents in the bonnets and clothes of the children are painted in almost pure pigments of cobalt blue, vermilion, or chrome orange. The metal chairs in the foreground had just replaced the wooden chairs in the garden in 1862.

The work is an early example of Manet’s style, inspired by Frans Hals and Diego Velázquez, and it is a prelude of his lifelong interest in portraying the subject of leisure in his art.

This painting inspired Manet’s contemporaries, such as Monet and Renoir to also paint large groups of people.

One of the final private owners of this painting was the collector Sir Hugh Lane who purchased it in 1903. After Lane’s death, when the Lusitania was sunk in 1915, an unwitnessed codicil to his will left the painting to the Dublin City Gallery, now known as The Hugh Lane.

The codicil was found to be invalid, and in 1917 a court case decided that his previous will left the work to the National Gallery in London.

After intervention from the Irish government, the two galleries reached a compromise in 1959. The Galleries agreed to share the paintings.

Édouard Manet

Édouard Manet was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life and was a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism.

His early masterpieces, about 20 years earlier than this painting, caused much controversy and served as an influence for the young painters who would create Impressionism.

In the last two decades of Manet’s life, he develops his style that served as a significant influence on future painters.

Music in the Tuileries

Title: Music in the Tuileries
Artist: Édouard Manet
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: 1862
Dimensions: Height: 76.2 cm (30 in); Width: 118.1 cm (46.4 in)
Museum: National Gallery, London (Displayed at The Hugh Lane, Dublin)

Édouard Manet

Name: Édouard Manet
Born: 1832 – Paris, France
Died: 1883 (aged 51) – Paris, France
Nationality: French
Notable works:
- Olympia
- A Bar at the Folies-Bergère
- In the Conservatory
- The Balcony
- Spring
- Nana
- Music in the Tuileries

Édouard Manet Quotes

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“There are no lines in nature, only areas of color, one against another.”

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“If I’m lucky, when I paint, first my patrons leave the room, then my dealers, and if I’m really lucky, I leave too.”

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“One must be of one’s time and paint what one sees.”

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“I paint what I see and not what others like to see.”

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“It is not enough to know your craft – you have to have feeling. Science is all very well, but for us, imagination is worth far more.”

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“I would kiss you, had I the courage.”

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“There are no lines in nature, only areas of color, one against another.”

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“There is only one true thing: instantly paint what you see. When you’ve got it, you’ve got it. When you haven’t, you begin again. All the rest is humbug.”

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“The country only has charms for those not obliged to stay there.”

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“I am influenced by everybody. But every time I put my hands in my pockets, I find someone else’s fingers there.”

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“One does not paint a landscape, a seascape, a figure. One paints an impression of an hour of the day.”

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“No one can be a painter unless he cares for painting above all else.”

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