Édouard ManetFrench, 1832–1883Civil War
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Chicago, United States
It belongs to the collection, but is not on display at present.
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- The museum
About the work
Édouard Manet drew on his painting The Dead Toreador (1864; National Gallery of Art) for this print, transforming its context from a morbid twist on a festive Spanish tauromaquia to the crisis in France’s short-lived Second Empire (1852–70). The tumultuous years 1870–71 marked the humiliating defeat of France in the Franco-Prussian war, the rise and suppression of the revolutionary Paris Commune, and the dawn of the Third Republic. In this print, an unidentified soldier lies behind a Parisian street barricade. A glimpse of a pin-striped civilian pant leg at the lower right hints at the encroachment of violence on everyday life.
Art Institute of ChicagoCC BY 4.0
Particulars
- Accession number
- 1946.342
What it shows
In the catalog
Sources
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Image: Art Institute of Chicago — CC0
Meanwhile, in the life of Édouard Manet
The whole life1869
Meets Eva Gonzalès
In 1869 Manet met the young painter Eva Gonzalès and offered that she pose for a portrait; she became his only formal student.
1870
The siege of Paris: Manet in the army
During the siege of Paris Manet, a convinced republican, sent his family to Oloron-Sainte-Marie in the south of France, while he himself, with many fellow artists, joined the army and took part in the defence of the capital; he was lucky to survive.
1870s
Refuses to exhibit with the Impressionists
Although his own work influenced and anticipated the Impressionist style, Manet resisted involvement in Impressionist exhibitions: he did not wish to be seen as the representative of a group identity and held that modern artists should seek to exhibit at the Salon.
1871
Manet's name on the Commune's Fédération des artistes
In his absence his friends added his name to the Paris Commune's “Fédération des artistes”; he himself stayed out of politics and perhaps returned to the city only after the “bloody week” — in a letter to Berthe Morisot of 10 June he writes that they had come back a few days earlier.
1871
Oloron and Bordeaux: letters to Bracquemond
In January 1871 Manet travelled to Oloron-Sainte-Marie in the Pyrenees and then visited Bordeaux, the provisional seat of the National Assembly, where Émile Zola showed him the sights. On 18 March he wrote to Félix Bracquemond that he had never imagined France could be represented by such doddering old fools.
1873
“Le Bon Bock”: a huge success
In his new studio in 1873 Manet painted “Le Bon Bock”, which became famous: for the first time in almost fifteen years he had a huge success, yet he did not turn into a fashionable, opportunistic painter.
