2024-04-23
In connection with the forthcoming exhibition "Discover Manet and Eva Gonzalès" (Discover Manet and Eva Gonzalès), a group of conservators examined Éduard Manet's portrait of Eva Gonzalès. It was discovered that the face had been repainted several times and that the painting was created on a previously made still life. The exhibition will be held at two venues - the Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin and then at The National Gallery in Lodnyn.
Éduard Manet was one of France's most famous painters and is considered a precursor to Impressionism. In his works, he often referred to the work of Titian, but changed compositions and misrepresented contexts. He sometimes offended the bourgeois public (the painting "Breakfast on the Grass" - a contrast of two dressed men, an undressed woman in contemporary reality).
The painter had only one official pupil - Eva Gonzalès (1849-1883). Although, like her master, she did not take part in the stirring Parisian Impressionist exhibitions, she is nevertheless included in this group of painters because of the way she painted. In spite of her early years, in which she was strongly influenced by the work of Manet, she managed to develop her own style. Her works were presented many times at the Salon.
In the portrait, Manet shows Gonzalès painting a still life at her easel. What is not to be missed - her stiff posture and expensive attire are clearly not suitable for artwork. The master began work on the work shortly after the young student arrived in his studio in 1869, and finished painting in 1870.
Thanks to X-ray examinations commissioned by the National Gallery in London, it was possible to show that many details in the painting had been altered - the face, the hair, the cut of the dress or the shape of the chair. The entire composition was created on a previously painted still life. A great deal of information can be deduced from this kind of research - including the fact that the painter often changed his concept and details in his creative process.