Le Dejeuner sur L'Herbe 1862-63
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
In English, "The Luncheon on the Grass", originally titled Le Bain (The Bath). In 1863, Manet shocked the French public by exhibiting his Déjeuner sur l'herbe. The shock value of a nude woman casually lunching with two fully dressed men, which was an affront to the propriety of the time, was accentuated by the familiarity of the figures. Manet's wife, Suzanne Leenhoff, and his favorite model, Victorine Meurent, both posed for the nude woman, which has Meurent's face, but Leenhoff's plumper body. The two men are Manet's brother Gustave Manet and his future brother-in-law, Ferdinand Leenhoff. Manet's refusal to conform to convention and his initiation of a new freedom from traditional subjects and modes of representation - can perhaps be considered as the departure point for Modern Art. The modernist reinvention of pictorial space had begun. To see the original: http://bit.ly/1QIQLwM
