Édouard Manet

A Virtual Tour of Édouard Manet

A Bar at the Folies-Bergère
In the Conservatory
The Balcony
Spring
Nana
Olympia
Music in the Tuileries
The Battle of the Kearsarge and the Alabama
The Kearsarge at Boulogne
“The Execution of Emperor Maximilian” by Édouard Manet
The Rue Mosnier Dressed with Flags

Highlights Tour of Édouard Manet

Olympia

“Olympia” by Édouard Manet shows a nude woman lying on a bed being brought flowers by a servant. Olympia’s confrontational gaze caused astonishment when the painting was first exhibited because some of the details in the painting identified her as a prostitute.

Also, “Olympia” was a name associated with prostitutes in the 1860’s Paris. Most paintings during this period of art that were this large size depicted historical or mythological events, so the significant proportions of this picture is another factor that caused surprise.

Olympia is identified in the painting as a courtesan or prostitute. Based on the symbols of the orchid in her hair, her bracelet, the pearl earrings, and the oriental shawl.

The black ribbon around her neck is in stark contrast with her pale skin, reinforcing wealth, and sensuality. Museum: Musée d’Orsay

A Bar at the Folies-Bergère

“A Bar at the Folies-Bergère” by Édouard Manet depicts a scene in the Folies Bergère nightclub in Paris. This painting shows Manet’s commitment to Realism in its detailed portrayal of a contemporary scene even though he has experimented with perspective and points of view.

The central figure of the barmaid stands before a mirror, facing the gentleman we can see in the reflection on the right. In the mirror’s reflection, we can see the world the barmaid surveys in front of her.

In the mirror reflection, she seems engaged with a customer, whoever in full face, she appears protectively withdrawn and remote. In the reflection, she seems to lean in and engage with her customers. In the other reality, she is ambivalent about the scene. Museum: Courtauld Gallery

In the Conservatory

“In the Conservatory” by Édouard Manet is set in a conservatory in Paris, it shows a fashionable couple of some social rank. Their rings convey their married status. Also, by the proximity of their hands, which reflects a hint of intimacy.

The woman is the focus of the portrait, as she is more prominently placed plus her more colorful attire. Their lack of engagement with the viewer creates a sense of detachment. The conservatory in this painting was in Paris, which was then owned by painter Otto Rosen.

Manet used the conservatory as a studio from 1878 to 79. The couple was Manet’s friends, the Guillemets, who owned a clothing shop. Museum: National Gallery (Berlin) – Alte Nationalgalerie

The Balcony

The Balcony by Édouard Manet depicts four figures on a balcony, one sitting, and the others standing. The painting was inspired by “Majas on the Balcony” by Francisco Goya.

The three people in the foreground were all friends of Manet, and yet seem to be disconnected from each other. The seated figure looks like a romantic and inaccessible heroine. The two standing characters seem to display indifference.

The boy in the background is not explicitly shown. For this painting, Manet adopted a restrained color palette, dominated by white, green, and black, with an accent of blue and red. Museum: Musée d’Orsay, Paris, France

Spring

Spring by Édouard Manet depicts the Parisian actress Jeanne DeMarsy in a floral dress with parasol and bonnet against a background of lush foliage and blue sky, as the embodiment of Spring.

She is portrayed poised and looking straight ahead, a picture of detachment even though she seems fully aware of our gaze. This painting was the first of a planned quartet of allegorical works using chic Parisian women to depict the four seasons.

The idea was to produce a series of seasons personified by contemporary ideals of women, fashion, and beauty. The series was never finished, and Manet died a year after completing only the second of the series, Autumn. Museum: Getty Museum

Nana

Nana by Édouard Manet shows a young woman who stands before a mirror with two extinguished candles; her face turned to the viewer. Her dress is incomplete.

She is wearing a white chemise, blue corset, silk stockings, and high-heeled shoes. The interior suggests that it is a boudoir. Behind the woman is a sofa with two pillows.

An elegantly dressed man sitting on the couch can be partly seen on the right of the painting.

The title and the many details suggest that the picture represents a high-class prostitute and her client. “Nana” was a popular assumed name for female prostitutes during the second half of the 19th century.

Painted in 1877, it was refused at the Salon of Paris because it was deemed to be contemptuous of the morality of the time.

French society was not prepared for such frank depictions of prostitution, and the critics did not see the artistic qualities of the work as they focused on the subject of the painting. Museum: Kunsthalle Hamburg

Music in the Tuileries

“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. Museums: National Gallery, London (Displayed at The Hugh Lane, Dublin)

The Battle of the Kearsarge and the Alabama

“The Battle of the Kearsarge and the Alabama” by Édouard Manet commemorates the Battle of Cherbourg of 1864, which was a naval engagement of the American Civil War.

The naval battle was between the Union cruiser USS Kearsarge and the Confederate raider CSS Alabama. Many spectators were able to see the action from the coast of France and saw the USS Kearsarge sink CSS Alabama.

Within one month of this battle, Manet had completed this painting, even though he had not witnessed the action himself. Manet relied on press descriptions of the battle and visits to Cherbourg to see the Kearsarge and compose this artwork.

This painting was the first known seascape by Manet with his imaginative depiction of the naval battle fought off the coast of France. The C.S.S. Alabama, the scourge of Union shipping, is shown sinking by her stern.

The Kearsarge at Boulogne

“The Kearsarge at Boulogne” by Édouard Manet depicts the anchored Union cruiser USS Kearsarge, the victor of the Battle of Cherbourg over the rebel privateer CSS Alabama.

Although he had not witnessed the battle, Manet visited Cherbourg within one month after and painted a watercolor of Kearsarge. This oil painting was based on his watercolor.

Later in 1864, Manet painted an account of the battle itself, “The Battle of the USS Kearsarge and the CSS Alabama.” These two paintings were his first depictions of current events by Manet.

The subject of the naval battle prompted his visit to the victorious ship that was anchor near Boulogne.

The outline of the vessel, however, did not satisfy Manet as it did not feature in his final painting, “The Battle of the Kearsarge and the Alabama” as smoke clouds obscured it.

“The Execution of Emperor Maximilian” by Édouard Manet

“The Execution of Emperor Maximilian” is a series of paintings by Édouard Manet from 1867 to 1869, depicting the execution by firing squad of Emperor Maximilian I.

Maximilian was born in 1832, the son of Archduke Franz Karl of Austria and Princess Sophie of Bavaria. He was encouraged by Napoleon III to become Emperor of Mexico following the French intervention in Mexico.

Maximilian arrived in Mexico in 1864. He faced significant opposition from forces loyal to the deposed president Benito Juárez throughout his reign, and the short-lived Second Mexican Empire collapsed after Napoleon withdrew French troops in 1866.

Maximilian was captured in 1867, sentenced to death at a court-martial, and executed, together with Generals Miguel Miramón and Tomás Mejía, on 19 June 1867.

The Rue Mosnier Dressed with Flags

“The Rue Mosnier Dressed with Flags” by Édouard Manet depicts a Parisian street, decorated with French flags for the first national holiday, which occurred on 30 June 1878. It was called the “Fête de la Paix,” or in English, “Celebration of Peace.”

The Rue Mosnier, which is now called the Rue de Berne, could be seen from Manet’s studio at 4 Rue de Saint-Pétersbourg. This canvas shows the view from his second-floor window, with tricolor flags hanging from the buildings along the road.

Manet captured the holiday afternoon in the top half of the composition with a patriotic harmony of the reds, whites, and blues of the French flag that waved along the street.

In the bottom half of the composition is a one-legged man on crutches, possibly a veteran wounded in the Franco-Prussian War. Also, at the bottom is a man carrying a ladder, and on the left is a fence holding back the rubble from building works.

The urban street was a subject of interest for Impressionist and Modernist painters. Manet reflected the transformation and growth of the Industrial Age and how it impacted society.

Name: Édouard Manet
Born: 1832 – Paris, France
Died: 1883 (aged 51) – Paris, France
Nationality: French
Notable works:
- A Bar at the Folies-Bergère
- In the Conservatory
- The Balcony
- Spring
- Nana
- Olympia
- Music in the Tuileries
- The Battle of the Kearsarge and the Alabama
- The Kearsarge at Boulogne
- “The Execution of Emperor Maximilian” by Édouard Manet
- The Rue Mosnier Dressed with Flags

A Tour of Artists

Duccio (1255 – 1319)
Sandro Botticelli (1445 – 1510)
Leonardo da Vinci (1452 – 1519)
Albrecht Durer (1471 – 1528)
Michelangelo (1475 – 1564)
Raphael (1483 – 1520)
Titian (1488 – 1576)
Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1525 – 1569)
Paolo Veronese (1528 – 1588)
El Greco (1541 – 1614)
Caravaggio (1571 – 1610)
Peter Paul Rubens (1577 – 1640)
Diego Velázquez (1599 – 1660)
Rembrandt (1606 – 1669)
Pieter de Hooch (1629 – 1684)
Johannes Vermeer (1632 – 1675)
Élisabeth Sophie Chéron (1648 – 1711)
Canaletto (1697 – 1768)
Francisco Goya (1746 – 1828)
Caspar David Friedrich (1774 – 1840)
J.M.W. Turner (1775 – 1851)
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780 – 1867)
Eugène Delacroix (1798 – 1863)
Rosa Bonheur (1822 – 1899)
John Everett Millais (1829 – 1896)
Frederic Leighton (1830 – 1896)
Édouard Manet (1832 – 1883)
Edgar Degas (1834 – 1917)
Paul Cézanne (1839 – 1906)
Claude Monet (1840 – 1926)
Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841 – 1919)
Henri Rousseau (1844 – 1910)
Mary Cassatt (1844 – 1926)
Elizabeth Thompson (1846 – 1933)
John William Waterhouse (1849 – 1917)
Vincent van Gogh (1853 – 1890)
John Singer Sargent (1856 – 1925)
Tom Roberts (1856 – 1931)
Lovis Corinth (1858 – 1925)
Georges Seurat (1859 – 1891)
Gustav Klimt (1862 – 1918)
Edvard Munch (1863 – 1944)
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864 – 1901)
Rupert Bunny (1864 – 1947)
Wassily Kandinsky (1866 – 1944)
Franz Marc (1880 – 1916)
Goyō Hashiguchi (1880 – 1921)
Amedeo Modigliani (1884 – 1920)
Artists and their Art

Édouard Manet Quotes

~~~

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

~~~

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

~~~

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

~~~

“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.”

~~~

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

~~~

“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.”

~~~

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

~~~

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

~~~

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

~~~

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

~~~

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

~~~