The Rabbit (Manet 1881)
The Rabbit | |
---|---|
Artist | Édouard Manet |
Year | 1881 |
Medium | Oil on canvas |
Dimensions | 97.5 cm × 61 cm (38.4 in × 24 in) |
Location | National Museum Wales, Cardiff |
The Rabbit is an 1881 oil painting by the French artist Édouard Manet, now displayed at the National Museum Wales in Cardiff, Wales. The work is a still life featuring a hung rabbit or hare (the work is sometimes referred as The Hare) which has been placed on a hook outside a closed house window.
Origin
The Rabbit was conceived as one of four decorative panels, and was painted not long after Manet had suggested a series of panels for the meeting chamber at the Hôtel de Ville in Paris, though nothing came of this concept. Completed in 1881, when Manet's health was in decline, The Rabbit was painted while the artist was spending the summer months at a villa in Versailles. The painting, which was one of the central pairings of a four panel set, was part of a new cycle of decorative work undertaken by Manet while at Versailles. The other central panel, along with The Rabbit conceived to representing hunting trophies, was The Eagle Owl which as of 2012 is part of the Buhrle Collection in Zurich.[1] The outer panels illustrate, on one a vine on a trellis and the other a corner of a garden. Two other pictures were grouped as part of the same inventory from his studio at the time of Manet's death, a vase of flowers and a watering can; but although they may be related to the same cycle of work are not believed to be part of the set of panels related to The Rabbit.[2]
The work was initially submitted to the Salon in Paris in 1882, but was not accepted. It was sold after Manet's death as part of a studio sale to the art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel. It later passed into the ownership of the Paris-based art firm, Bernheim-Jeune. In 1917 The Rabbit was purchased from Bernheim-Jeune by the Welsh philanthrapist Gwendoline Davies, who in 1918 exhibited it at the Victoria Art Gallery in Bath. On Gwendoline's death in 1951, she bequeathed her collection of Impressionist works to the National Museum of Wales, among them The Rabbit.[2][3] As of 2012 it is on view at the National Museum Cardiff in gallery 11.[4]
Analysis
The Rabbit is painted in a bold and loose style, and is intended to be viewed from a distance. This is in stark contrast to an earlier work by Manet also entitled the Rabbit (1866), which is completed in a far more traditional French style of still-life painting. This earlier painting, which is in the style of Chardin, is far more conventional and detailed than the later painting. The 1881 picture is a far more casual work, with fast and broad brushstrokes suggesting various textures, not only in the fur of the dead animal, but also in the curtains behind the window and the climbing plant which both frame the hanging rabbit.[2] This latter work is much closer to the Impressionist style.[4]
Gallery
- Manet's 1866 painting held at Fondation Dubrujeaud, Avignon
See also
References
- ^ "The Eagle Owl, 1881". buehrle.ch. Retrieved 13 March 2013.
- ^ a b c Sumner, Ann (2005). Colour and Light: Fifty Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Works at the National Museum of Wales. Cardiff: National Museum of Wales. p. 80. ISBN 0-7200-0551-5.
- ^ "From Industry to Impressionism - what two sisters did for Wales". museumwales.ac.uk. 1 January 2009. Archived from the original on 11 October 2012. Retrieved 9 October 2012.
- ^ a b "The Rabbit". museumwales.ac.uk. Retrieved 9 October 2012.
External links
- The Rabbit at BBC.co.uk
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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)