Manet - A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (1882)

The Last Glass in Paris

Édouard Manet was dying when he painted the Folies-Bergère. He was trapped in a body failing from syphilis, propped up by friends and assistants just to reach the canvas. This wasn't a nostalgic look at a favorite haunt. It was a cold, hard stare at the way the world was turning into a commodity.

The Folies-Bergère was the first true middle-class cathedral of distraction. You could buy a beer, a song, or a person under the same roof. Look at Suzon, the barmaid. She modeled for months to get that specific look of consumerist boredom. She is surrounded by the first global trademarks, like the red triangles on the Bass Pale Ale bottles, yet she is completely alone in the noise.

Then there is the mirror. Critics call it a mistake, but Manet didn't make mistakes of that magnitude. The reflection is shifted, impossible, and unsettling. It forces you, the viewer, to stand where the predatory gentleman stands in the glass. It turns the act of looking into an act of participation.

Paris in 1882 was a sprawling hallucination of gaslight and the new, harsh glare of electricity. Manet captured the transition from the romantic glow of the past to the unforgiving reality of the modern age. He died the year after it was exhibited, leaving behind a masterpiece that remains as detached and haunting as Suzon’s vacant stare.

References

• Clark, T.J. The Painting of Modern Life: Paris in the Art of Manet and his Followers. Revised edition. Princeton University Press, 1999.
• Distel, Anne. Impressionism: The First Collectors. New York: Abrams, 1990.
• Herbert, Robert L. Impressionism: Art, Leisure, and Parisian Society. Yale University Press, 1988.
• House, John. Manet's 'Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe'. Cambridge University Press, 1998.
• Krell, Alan. Manet and the Painters of Contemporary Life. Thames & Hudson, 1996.