Manet's A Bar at Folies Bergere

Susan stands at the bar and gazes sadly into space at least I think she's sad others disagree and this illusive look on her face has been described as blank board over made-up and even under made-up there's no consensus she's dressed in the typical barmaid uniform of the folly black bodice frilly neckline except for these flowers across her decolletage those are unusual but the folly bear share the barmaids generally displayed a little more of themselves there's even a naughty cartoon on the subject so she's at the bar and she's serving a customer who's out here where I am but as you can see if I'm here and the camera man's behind me then the three of us form a horribly confusing an ugly reflection overlapping and messy so Manny in a brilliant and fearless bit of modern picture making has actually moved the reflection from behind Susan where you can't see it - over here where you can book loads of speculation have been published about this mysterious reflection but the simple truth is if it had stayed where it should be we couldn't have seen it in the reflection Suzanne is serving a top-hatted chap with a moustache rather blurred than insubstantial he's been described as sinister but shadowy is a better word and of course he is you in your belly POC form there are other details to note as well up in the corner a pair of dangling legs a trapeze artiste is performing for the crowd among the bottles some bass beer the folly bear share was now popular with English tourists what were they here for what can it all mean what are we being told the fact that so many people have so many views about the fully Bashar is proof of the paintings potency this is one of the greatest masterpieces in London and it never fails to set the emotions whirling in the mind ticking my own view is that it's a simpler painting than we usually admit MANET is showing us his tender side again that remarkable empathy he had with modern women the shifted reflexion has become the barmaids outer reality the world out here she meanwhile stands and dreams in her inner reality cut off from us in a world of her own Suzanne is another of his Susanna's a female victim of the male gaze a casualty of the city an art historians can twist themselves into as many compositional knots as they want but they can't change the fact that this is a painting about a girl lost in her own thoughts sad exposed vulnerable and therefore so very modern you

Channel: zczfilms

Views: 41,928

Rating: 4.909091 out of 5

Keywords: Waldemar Januszczak, Art, Documentary, Manet, Realism, Royal Academy, Folies Bergere, Courtauld Institute, ZCZ Films

Id: Ye5kbf2_wdI

Length: 4min 20sec (260 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 22 2013