Emily A. Beeny: "Édouard Manet and the Illusion of Effortlessness"

Published 2019-11-20
Emily A. Beeny, Associate Curator of Drawings, The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Claude Monet once remarked that Manet “always wanted his painting to look as if done at the first attempt,” but the truth was more complicated. Manet went to great lengths to perfect his work and even greater lengths to conceal the effort involved. From his earliest oil paintings to his late watercolors, this lecture contrasts Manet’s cultivation of a reputation for effortlessness with the arduous reality of his practice.

All Comments (18)
  • Thanks so much for your illuminating talk on my favourite artist, Manet; wonderful to know more about how he worked and to be given a sense of the real man's process. 🙏
  • @ritabiro5105
    Moneys salon and works are everlasting and great.Thanks for your lectures some of them l have seen in Paris Dorsay Muzeum and in Palace of Arts in Budapest.Fricks collection must have also some beautiful.
  • Well done. The late profile portraits are hardly my favorite works by Manet, but I appreciate being pushed to look at them more closely. And Dr. Beeny is a fine lecturer.
  • This is the kindest thing I can think of to say, and I say this as a woman and a painter: What you folks understand about men and artists is not a lot.
  • @adagietto2523
    Very informative about his illustrated correspondence, with those wonderful little watercolours.
  • @anklamer
    Brilliant! Learned a lot of new stuff!
  • @annemytka6507
    Did Edouard Monet paint in water colour, and cover with glass mine is about over 100 years old, the frame is in terrible condition Anne Marie Sydney Australia 🇦🇺 thank you 😊
  • @salassian3162
    What's wrong with the closed captions of this video? Is google having a meltdown?
  • @annemytka6507
    I have a Edward Manet looks very old but, she looks like a pastel on paper?