French artist Edouard Manet was one of the most influential artists in the nineteenth century. Although he associated heavily with the Impressionists, he forged his own path as an artist and defied categorization throughout his career.
Born in Paris in 1832, Manet was raised by a well-off, well-connected family who groomed him for a career in law. His uncle, however, regularly took the young Manet to the Louvre and encouraged him to pursue painting. In 1845, he enrolled in a drawing course taught by Antonin Proust, who would be come the Minister of Fine Arts and Manet’s lifelong friend. After several years of travel and study, Manet opened his own studio in 1856.
Manet kept the company of Impressionist artists like Edgar Degas, Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir. But while he was heavily influenced by their work, he resisted exhibiting with them and being classified as Impressionist. Like the Impressionists, he often painted with quick, successive strokes, but unlike them, he also favored a much darker palette, as you can see in the following image:
There were other differences as well. Like the Impressionists, Manet painted everyday scenes from Parisian life, but unlike them, he introduced somewhat controversial elements, like the nude in this image:
Again like the Impressionists, Manet enjoyed painting outdoors -- but unlike them, he felt that studio work was equally important. His choice of subject matter also took him into decidedly non-Impressionist terrain, as in his famous war paintings.
Throughout his career, Manet was resisted by art critics and yet championed by contemporary artists like Stephane Mallarme and Charles Baudelaire. Today, he is celebrated worldwide as one of the founding fathers of modern art in the nineteenth century.
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