Bar in the Folies Bergère
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| Bar in the Folies Bergère |
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| Édouard Manet , 1882 |
| Oil on canvas |
| 96 × 130 cm |
| Courtauld Institute of Art , London |
Bar in den Folies Bergère (French: Un bar aux Folies Bergère ) is an oil painting by the French artist Édouard Manet . It was made a few months before his death in the spring of 1883 and shows a scene in the Parisian nightclub Folies Bergère . Critics refer to the composition as an optical puzzle. There are many questions that give rise to various speculations. The picture is considered to be a pioneer of impressionism. The painting was owned by the composer Emmanuel Chabrier , who was a close friend of Manet. It is now in the Courtauld Institute of Art in London .
history
The painting was created in 1882 and was first exhibited in the salon that same year . Even back then, critics noted that the objects in the foreground did not appear in the places in the mirror where one would expect them. The bearded visitor of the mirror image is nowhere to be seen in the foreground, the posture of the mirrored barmaid is not the posture of the one who turns her face towards us. Manet was accused of negligence by the critics.
Manet loved Paris and city life, which is expressed in many of the motifs in his pictures. The Folies Bergère nightclub and cabaret were a popular establishment for the upper class at that time; Manet was one of the regulars. Based on the sketches drawn in the restaurant, he made the painting in his studio. There the barmaid Suzon from the Folies Bergères sat as his model. Manet died on April 30, 1883, the “Bar in den Folies-Bergère” is considered his last great work.
Image description
In the center of the picture is the barmaid Suzon at work. Her melancholy, absent-minded expression does not match the hustle and bustle around her. She stands alone in a room full of people enjoying themselves. She doesn't return the viewer's gaze. All other people are only shown in the mirror as a background. The people are elegantly dressed, men in top hats and women in large hats. Most of them are not worked out naturalistically, but indicated in the style of impressionism .
Furthermore, the man in the mirror stands out who apparently addresses Suzon, but cannot be seen in the foreground. This scene is the subject of much speculation. It is assumed that it stands at the point where the viewer of the picture should be in reality. It is doubtful whether the perspective is presented realistically. There is an investigation by the Australian Malcom Park based on optical analyzes, which considers it possible that the perspectives are correct. Malcom Park assumes that the picture viewer is not standing in front of the lady, but offset to the right in the room and the lady has turned slightly towards the viewer. However, he does not comment on the bartender's different attitudes.
To the left and right of Suzon are some bottles, including champagne and simple beer bottles. Like a still life, a little off center to the left of her is a small vase with two white roses and a tall bowl filled with oranges. Another optical inconsistency is the position of the bottles on the left side of the picture. In the reality of the picture, they are just in front of the edge of the counter, but in the reflection they are far behind the edge.
There is a study of the painting from 1881. The core elements of the image design are already there. However, there are also numerous deviations from the later original.
The composition of the picture is dominated by a vertical line in the middle of the picture, which runs from the posture of the lady's head down to the end of the button bar, as well as the horizontal line of the counter. The vertical underlines Suzon's expression and gives her a certain aloofness. From the lady's head over the two arms to the bottles on the left and the fruit bowl on the right, one can see a pyramid-shaped image design. This creates the effect of monumentality and solemn seriousness. In addition, the wall column in the mirror represents a vertical line that separates the two depictions of the bartender. X-ray examinations of the canvas revealed that, similar to the study, Manet first crossed the lady's arms in front of her stomach, with the right hand grasping the left wrist. Manet then painted over this design.
Different shades of silver-gray and blue-black determine the color impression; there are also ocher and brown as well as white. The colors in the foreground are more pure and luminous than those in the background. The deeper the room becomes, the less it can be seen. The image blurs backwards, only the bar girl looks three-dimensional.
Image “Las Meninas” as a model
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The “Bar in den Folies-Bergère” is reminiscent of the painting Las Meninas (1656) by the Spanish painter Diego Velázquez . Manet was an admirer of Velazquez, so it can be guessed that the connection is no coincidence. “Las Meninas” shows the five-year-old king's daughter Margarita surrounded by court servants. A mirror hangs in the background and reflects the upper bodies of the king and queen, who stand outside the depicted room and look at the people depicted. The painting has always led to new interpretations in literature. The assumption is that Manet was influenced by the picture and translated the subject into his time.
Attempts at interpretation
The attempts at interpretation in the literature are numerous. Among other things, they revolve around the following topics:
- the reflection with the reproduction of a real and a mirrored world,
- the loneliness of the bartender and the exuberance of the customers,
- the missing cylinder man in the picture reality,
- the class antagonism between the distinguished man of the social upper class versus the young, erotically attractive woman of the lower class.
In the mirror image, Suzon appears slightly leaning forward and attentive to her job, as the guest in the mirror shows. Mirror image and reality do not match. Manet shows the woman from two sides and towards the viewer on two different levels of reality, as a bar lady and as a lonely person. He addresses the gap between appearance and reality, which is reinforced by the extensive use of a mirror as an essential pictorial element. "Bar in the Folies Bergère" can also be seen as a socially critical image. Some authors interpret the picture as a microcosm of bourgeois society. The working class, who have to earn their living without any zest for life, and the upper class, who enjoy themselves uninhibited.
literature
- Hans Jantzen : Eduard Manets Bar aux Folies-Bergère , in Oswald Goetz (Ed.): Articles for Georg Swarzenski on January 11, 1951 . Berlin: Mann, 1951, pp. 228-232
Web links
- Manet, A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (Smarthistory.art, history, conversation) Youtube from September 27, 2017 (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Manet's Bar at the Folies-Bergere. In: The J. Paul Getty Museum. September 5, 2007, accessed November 8, 2018 .
- ↑ a b Gilles Néret: Manet. Taschen Verlag, 2017, ISBN 978-3-8365-3508-3 .
- ↑ a b A Bar at the Folies-Bergère. In: The Courtauld Institute of Art. Retrieved November 6, 2018 .
- ↑ a b Manet: 'Bar in den Folies-Bergère' - my life without me (1882). In: mahogany. Retrieved November 5, 2018 .
- ^ A b c Manet's Bar at the Folies-Bergère: One Scholar's Perspective. In: The J. Paul Getty Trust. Retrieved November 6, 2018 .
- ↑ Malcolm Park, Ambiguity, and the Engagement of Spatial Illusion within the Surface of Manet's Paintings (PhD diss., University of New South Wales, Australia, 2001).
- ↑ a b c Diedrichs reads Imdahl (part 12): The viewer and the 'mistakes' in the picture. In: Insights into art history in individual works. October 16, 2016, accessed November 8, 2018 .
- ↑ Jonathan Jones: A Bar at the Folies-Bergere, Edouard Manet (1882). In: the Guardian. October 21, 2000, accessed November 6, 2018 .
- ↑ a b Brian A. Oard: Capitalism and the Death of the Soul. In: Beauty and Terror: Essays on the Power of Painting. Retrieved November 7, 2018 .
- ^ Greub: Reflections of Las Meninas. Introduction. In: Greub (ed.): Las Meninas in the mirror of interpretations. 2001.
- ↑ Werner Faulstich: "A bar in the Folies-Bergère" (1882) by Edouard Manet. (PDF) In: Uni Lüneburg. Retrieved November 9, 2018 .