La Nymphe surprise
La Nymphe surprise (Surprised Nymph) | |
---|---|
Artist | Édouard Manet |
Year | 1861 (1861) |
Medium | Oil on canvas |
Dimensions | 122 cm × 144 cm (48 in × 57 in) |
Location | National Museum of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires |
La Nymphe surprise, or Surprised Nymph, is a painting by the French impressionist painter Édouard Manet, created in 1861. The model was Suzanne Leenhoff, a pianist whom he married two years later. The painting is a key work in Manet's production, marking the beginning of a new period in his artistic career and generally in the history of modernism in French painting. It is in National Museum of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires[1] and it is considered one of the collection's highlights. La Nymphe surprise remained in the artist's possession his entire life, and there is evidence that, apart from the emotional significance it represented for the artist, Manet considered this painting as one of his most important works.[2][3][4]
History
The model of the painting is Édouard Manet's lover, the Dutchwoman Suzanne Leenhoff, with whom he had a secret affair. This affair developed while the young Manet was still living in his parents' house, where Suzanne–who was three years Manet's senior– was engaged as his brothers' piano teacher in 1849.[5] Their relationship was kept secret from his family. Manet and Suzanne married in 1863,[6] two years after the completion of this painting in 1861.[1] The relationship lasted throughout their lives.[7]
Nymphs were female spirits of nature, female deities from Greek mythology, often depicted as young women, who dwell in mountains and small woods, by springs and rivers.[8] Several authors think that the motif is similar to Rembrandt's Susanna and the Elders, considering that the model's name is Suzanne, she was Dutch and the figure's pose is identical with the one in the painting. In a different point, Françoise Cachin argues that Manet was probably inspired by Jean-Baptiste Santerre's 1704 painting of the same subject, pointing out the position of the arm and the treatment of the material.[9]
Manet kept this painting in his atelier. The painting was exhibited at the Salon des Artistes Français in 1865.[2] This painting was painted two years before the Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe (The Luncheon on the Grass) and Olympia.[10] The painting was purchased by the National Museum of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires and was placed on display at the Museum, as one of the institution's highlights.[11]
Painting
Manet's La Nymphe surprise depicts a young woman sitting in a wooded landscape beside a lake, looking surprised at the viewer. There is a blue iris growing at her feet, and she wears nothing on her body except the white pearls around her neck and a ring on her little finger. The nymph's glance, contrary to Olympia's provocative glance, is surprised and shy, as if she has found the viewer watching her, invading her privacy, disturbing her.[11][12]
See also
- List of paintings by Édouard Manet
- 1861 in art
- Boy Carrying a Sword, depicting Manet's and Suzanne's son
- The Reading
- Luncheon in the Studio
- Impressionism
- Nana
References
- ^ a b "La Nymphe surprise". Google Cultural Institute. Retrieved 20 February 2015.
- ^ a b "the-collection-highlights". www.mnba.gob.ar. Archived from the original on 2016-03-04.
- ^ Willard Huntington Wright (1928). Modern Painting, Its Tendency and Meaning. Library of Alexandria. p. [page needed]. ISBN 9781465543585.
- ^ Willard Huntington Wright (1928). "Modern Painting, Its Tendency and Meaning". p. [page needed].
- ^ Manet, Édouard, Mary Anne Stevens, and Lawrence W. Nichols. Manet: Portraying Life. Toledo: Toledo Museum of Art. 2012. p. 164. ISBN 9781907533532
- ^ Manet, Édouard, Mary Anne Stevens, and Lawrence W. Nichols. Manet: Portraying Life. Toledo: Toledo Museum of Art. 2012. p. 167. ISBN 9781907533532
- ^ Davies, Serena (18 January 2015). "Did Manet have a secret son?". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 20 February 2015.
- ^ "Nymph". www.theoi.com. Retrieved 20 February 2015.
- ^ Cachin, Françoise (1991). Manet. Translated from the French by Emily Read. New York: H. Holt and Co. pp. 32–33. ISBN 0-8050-1793-3. OCLC 1194438530 – via the Internet Archive.
- ^ "Impressionnisme Édouard Manet". www.aparences.net. 17 September 2014. Retrieved 20 February 2015.
- ^ a b Farwell, Beatrice (April 1975). "Manet's 'Nymphe Surprise'". The Burlington Magazine. 117 (865). The Burlington Magazine Publications Ltd.: 224–227, 229. JSTOR 877979.
- ^ "History's roving eye turns to the femme fatale". www.buenosairesherald.com. Retrieved 20 February 2015.
External links
- The ten most popular nymphs in paintings
- v
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- List of paintings
- The Barque of Dante (1854–1858)
- Christ the Gardener (1856–1859)
- The Absinthe Drinker (1859)
- Spanish Cavaliers (1859)
- Portrait of Madame Brunet (1860)
- Portrait of Monsieur and Madame Manet (1860)
- The Spanish Singer (1860)
- Boy Carrying a Sword (1861)
- La Nymphe surprise (1861)
- The Street Singer (1862)
- Music in the Tuileries (1862)
- The Old Musician (1862)
- Portrait of Victorine Meurent (1862)
- Mademoiselle V. in the Costume of an Espada (1862)
- Little Lange (1862)
- The Luncheon on the Grass (1863)
- La Négresse (1863)
- Olympia (1863)
- Young Man Dressed as a Majo (1863)
- The Dead Man (1864))
- The Bullfight (1864–65)
- The Dead Christ with Angels (1864)
- The Kearsarge at Boulogne (1864)
- The Battle of the Kearsarge and the Alabama (1864)
- The Races at Longchamp (1865)
- Jesus Insulted by the Soldiers (1865)
- Bullfight (1865–66)
- Bullfight – Death of the Bull (1865)
- The Matador Saluting (1866)
- The Fifer (1866)
- A Young Lady in 1866 (1866)
- The Execution of Emperor Maximilian (1867)
- Portrait of Emile Zola (1868)
- Boy Blowing Bubbles (1868)
- Madame Manet at the Piano (1867–68)
- The Balcony (1868)
- Luncheon in the Studio (1868)
- The Reading (1868)
- The Port of Boulogne by Moonlight (1868)
- Departure of the Folkestone Steamer (1869)
- The Brioche (1870)
- Repose (1870)
- The Funeral (1870)
- Effect of Snow on Petit-Montrouge (1870)
- Berthe Morisot with a Bouquet of Violets (1872)
- Tarring a Boat (1873)
- The Railway (1873)
- The Croquet Game (1873)
- Masked Ball at the Opera House (1873)
- Argenteuil (1874)
- Berthe Morisot with a Fan (1874)
- Claude Monet Painting in his Studio (1874)
- Boating (1874)
- Portrait of Marguerite de Conflans (c. 1876)
- Portrait of Stéphane Mallarmé (1876)
- Le Suicidé (1877–1881)
- Nana (1877)
- Plum Brandy (c. 1877)
- The Rue Mosnier Dressed with Flags (1878)
- Blonde Woman with Bare Breasts (c. 1878)
- Chez Tortoni (c. 1878–1880)
- Georges Clemenceau (Fort Worth) (1879)
- Georges Clemenceau (Paris) (1879)
- Chez le Père Lathuille (1879)
- Portrait of Marguerite Gauthier-Lathuille (1879)
- In the Conservatory (1879)
- Madame Manet in the Conservatory (1879)
- The Waitress (1879)
- Corner of a Café-Concert (1879)
- The Café-Concert (1879)
- Self-Portrait with Palette (1879)
- A Bundle of Asparagus (1880)
- A Sprig of Asparagus (1880)
- Portrait of Countess Albazzi (1880)
- Portrait of Monsieur Pertuiset the Lion-Hunter (1881)
- Dead Eagle Owl (1881)
- The Rabbit (1881)
- Rochefort's Escape (1881)
- Spring (1881)
- Autumn (1882)
- A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (1882)
- The House at Rueil (1882)
- Flowers in a Crystal Vase (1882)
- White Lilacs in a Glass Vase (1882)
- A Studio at Les Batignolles (1870 painting)
- Bazille's Studio (1870 painting)
- The Impressionists (2006 series)