The Balcony

The Balcony shows four people gathered beside a green railing, while the dark interior behind them offers few visible details. On the left, seated on a black stool, is Berthe Morisot in a white gauze dress, holding a red fan. It was the first time Manet painted her, and she later married Eugène, the painter's brother. Beside her, the violinist Fanny Claus adjusts her gloves, dressed in white with green accessories. Standing behind them, a cigar in hand, is the landscape painter Antoine Guillemet, wearing a violet tie. A fourth figure, barely visible inside the room, is probably Manet's son Léon.

What stands out most is the distance between the figures: none of them looks at the others, and their gazes drift beyond the frame. Manet handled them almost like objects in a still life rather than people in relation, which unsettled critics at the 1869 Salon, who found the work discordant. The palette is restrained, dominated by white, black and green, with touches of violet and red, and the sharp green of the railing drew much comment at the time.

The idea came to Manet during a stay in Boulogne-sur-Mer and relates to Goya's Majas on a Balcony, which he had seen in the Prado. Before composing the group, he made numerous studies of each figure on its own. After the painter's death, the work was acquired by Gustave Caillebotte, who bequeathed it to the French state; today it is held at the Musée d'Orsay. Its legacy continued into the twentieth century, when René Magritte reworked it in 1950, replacing the figures with coffins. The painting still invites viewers to wonder what separates the one who looks from the one who is looked at.

Painter

Édouard Manet

Date

1868

Medium

oil paint, canvas

Dimensions

170 × 124 cm

Museum

Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Genre

genre art, group portrait

Depicts

painter, Berthe Morisot, sitting, dog, Fanny Claus, glove, balcony, hand fan

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