You'd think that there'd be nothing new to see in a major museum show devoted to Edouard Manet. But the exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago, Manet and Modern Beauty, is full of surprises. There a few examples of his most celebrated works, such as Boating from 1874-75, but it's the many pieces in different media and on a small scale that really take your breath away.
There are lots of watercolours, often contained within letters that are displayed in frames on the gallery walls. The looseness and spontaneity of these quick and closely observed studies is endlessly delightful.
There's even a case with the watercolour box he was using close to his death in 1883. The drawings, too, are fresh and intimate in nature.
Many of the oil and pastel pictures are selected from an 1880 exhibition in Paris. The final gallery in the show is filled with small pictures he painted during his last months, many of which are studies of flowers or vegetables such as asparagus. Despite their apparently humble appearance, they are each, almost without exception, created by the hand of a master who knew so much about colour and about mark-making that one can look at these works and feel they can stand comparison to Olympia and Dejenuer sur l'Herbe.
This comes through even in a detail photo:
This comes through even in a detail photo:
