MANET AND WHISTLER AGAINST THE WORLD

Let us now cross the channel again, and see what is going on there, in 1863. Evidently there is something on, or there would not be so much excitement. As we approach the Capital we are aware of one name being prominent in the general uproar—that of Édouard Manet.

Manet's revolt against tradition began before he became an artist, as was in fact necessary, or he would never have been allowed to become one. The traditions of the Bourgoisie were sacred, and their power and importance since the revolution of 1848 not to be lightly set aside. But young Manet was so determined that he was at last allowed by his bourgeois parents to have his way, and was sent to study under that very rough diamond Couture. Now again his "revolting" qualities showed themselves, this time in the life class. Théodore Duret, his friend and biographer, puts it so amusingly that a quotation, untranslated, is imperative:—"Cette repulsion qui se développe chez Manet pour l'art de la tradition," he says, "se manifeste surtout par le mépris qu'il témoigne aux modèles posant dans l'atelier et à l'étude du nu telle qu'elle était alors conduite. Le culte de l'antique comme on le comprenait dans la première moitié du xixe siècle parmi les peintres avait amené la recherche de modèles speciaux. On leur demandait des formes pleines. Les hommes en particulier devaient avoir une poitrine large et bombée, un torse puissant, des membres musclés. Les individus doués des qualités requises qui posaient alors dans les ateliers, s'etaient habitués à prendre des attitudes prétendues expressive et heroïques, mais toujours tendues et conventionelles, d'où l'imprévu était banni. Manet, porté vers le naturel et épris de recherches, s'irritait de ces poses d'un type fixe et toujours les mêmes. Aussi faisait-il tres mauvais ménage avec les modèles. Il cherchait à en obtenir des poses contraires à leurs habitudes, auxquelles ils se refusaient. Les modèles connus qui avaient vu les morceaux faits d'après leurs torses conduire certains élèves à l'école de Rome, alors la suprême récompense, et qui dans leur orgueil s'attribuaient presqu'une part du succès, se revoltaient de voir un tout jeune homme ne leur témoigner aucun respect. Il paraît que fatigué de l'eternelle étude du nu, Manet aurait essayé de draper et même d'habiller les modèles, ce qui aurait causé parmi eux une véritable indignation."

It was in 1863 that the storm of popular fury burst over Manet's head, on the exhibition of his first important picture, painted three years before, generally known as Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe. This wonderful canvas was something so new and so surprising that it was rejected by the jury of the Salon. But in company with less conspicuous though equally unacceptable pieces by such men as Bracquemond, Cazin, Fantin-Latour, Harpignies, Jongkind, J. P. Laurens, Le Gros, Pissarro, Vollon, and Whistler, it was accorded an exhibition, alongside the official Salon, which was called le Salon des refusés. Being the largest and most conspicuous work shown, it attracted no less attention than if it had been officially hung, and probably much more. "Ainsi ce Déjeuner sur l'herbe," says M. Duret, "venait-il faire comme une énorme tache. Il donnait la sensation de quelquechose outré. Il heurtait la vision. Il produisait, sur les yeux du public de ce temps, l'effet de la pleine lumière sur les yeux du hibou."

There was more than one reason for this remarkable picture surprising and shocking the sensibilities of the public. It represents a couple of men in everyday bourgeois costume, one sitting and the other reclining on the grass under trees, while next to one of them is seated a young woman, her head turned to the spectator, in no costume at all. A profusion of articles de déjeuner is beside her, and it is evident that they are only waiting to arrange the meal till a second young woman, who is seen bathing in the near background, is ready to join them. The subject and composition are reminiscent of Giorgione's beautiful and famous Fête Champêtre, in the Louvre, and Manet quite frankly and in quite good faith pleaded Giorgione as his precedent when assailed on grounds of good taste. But unfortunately he had not put his male figures in "fancy dress," and the public could hardly be expected to realise that Giorgione had not, either. As for the painting, it was a revelation. He had broken every canon of tradition—and yet it was a marvellous success!

Another outburst greeted the appearance of the wonderful Olympia in 1865, this time in the official catalogue. This is now enshrined in the Louvre. It was painted in 1863, but fortunately, perhaps, Manet had not the courage to exhibit it then—for who can tell to what length the fury of the Philistines might not have been goaded by two such shocks? As it was, this second violation of the sacred traditions of the nude, which had been exclusively reserved for allegorical subjects, was considered an outrage; and the innocent, natural model, of by no means voluptuous appearance, was regarded as a disgraceful intrusion into the chaste category of nymphs and goddesses. As a painter, however, Manet had shown himself unmistakably as the great figure of

PLATE XLVIII.—ÉDOUARD MANET  OLYMPIA  Louvre, Paris
PLATE XLVIII.—ÉDOUARD MANET
OLYMPIA
Louvre, Paris

the age, and if we have to go to Paris or to New York to catch a glimpse of any of his work, it is partly because we are too backward in seizing opportunities so eagerly snapped up by others.

The next great storm in the artistic world followed in the wake of one of Manet's companions in adversity at the Salon des RefusésJames M'Neill Whistler, who left Paris and settled with his mother in Chelsea in the late 'sixties. That he should have existed for fifteen whole years without breaking forth into strife is so extraordinary that we are almost tempted to attribute it to the influence of his mother, who used to bring him to the old church on Sundays, as the present writer dimly remembers. In this case it was not the public, but the critic, John Ruskin, who so deftly dropped the fat into the fire. Having, as we saw, taken up the cudgels for poor Turner against the public in 1843, and for the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1850, he now, in 1877, ranged himself on the other side, and accused Whistler of impertinence in "flinging a pot of paint in the face of the public." The action for libel which Whistler commenced in the following year resulted in strict fact in a verdict of one farthing damages for the libelled one; but in reality the results were much farther reaching. The artist had vindicated not only himself, but his art, from the attacks of the ignorant and bumptious. "Poor art!" Whistler wrote, "What a sad state the slut is in, an these gentlemen shall help her. The artist alone, by the way, is to no purpose and remains unconsulted; his work is explained and rectified without him, by the one who was never in it—but upon whom God, always good though sometimes careless, has thrown away the knowledge refused to the author, poor devil!" This recalls Turner's comment on Ruskin's eulogies—which Whistler had probably never heard of—and making every allowance for Whistler's fiery, combative nature, and sharp pen, there is much truth, and truth that needed telling, in his contention. "Art," he continues, "that for ages has hewn its own history in marble, and written its own comments on canvas, shall it suddenly stand still, and stammer, and wait for wisdom from the passer-by? For guidance from the hand that holds neither brush nor chisel? Out upon the shallow conceit!"

Of the hopeless banality of the critics during this period there are plenty of examples to be found without looking very far. Several of the most amusing have been embodied in a little volume of "Whistler Stories," lately compiled by Mr Don C. Seitz of New York. Here we find The Standard's little joke about Whistler paying his costs in the action—apart from those allowed on taxation, that is to say—"But he has only to paint, or, as we believe he expresses it 'knock off' three or four 'symphonies' or 'harmonies'—or perhaps he might try his hand at a Set of Quadrilles in Peacock Blue?—and a week's labour will set all square." Then there is this priceless revelation of his art when questioning his class in Paris. "Do you know what I mean when I say tone, value, light, shade, quality, movement, construction, etc.?" Chorus, "Oh, yes, Mr Whistler!" "I'm glad, for it's more than I do myself." More serious was the verdict of Sir George Scharf, keeper of the National Gallery, when (in 1874) there was a proposal to purchase the portrait of Carlyle. "Well," he said, icily, on looking at the picture, "and has painting come to this!"

High place, it would seem, did not always conduce to an appreciation of high art. Here is the opinion of Sir Charles Eastlake, F.R.I.B.A., also keeper of the

PLATE XLIX.—J. M. WHISTLER  LILLIE IN OUR ALLEY  In the possession of John J. Cowan, Esq.
PLATE XLIX.—J. M. WHISTLER
LILLIE IN OUR ALLEY
In the possession of John J. Cowan, Esq.

National Gallery, published in 1883, on one of Rembrandt's pictures in the Louvre:—

"The Bath, a very ugly and offensive picture, in which the principal object is the ill-proportioned figure of a naked woman, distinguished by flesh tones whose colour suggests the need of a bath rather than the fact that it has been taken. The position of the old servant wiping the woman's feet is not very intelligible, and the drawing of the bather's legs is distinctly defective. The light and shade of the picture, though obviously untrue to natural effect, are managed with the painter's usual dexterity."