Edward Mane. Bar at the Folies Bergère. 1882 Courtauld Institute of Art, London.
Edouard Manet painted his painting Bar at the Folies Bergère at the end of his life, already a very sick man. Despite his illness, he created a picture that is different from all his previous works.
Basically, his work is unambiguous and concise. “The bar at the Folies Bergère, on the contrary, contains a number of mysteries that haunt the indifferent observer.
The painting depicts a bar saleswoman in the still famous cafe-variety show “Folies-Bergere” (Paris, rue Richet, 32).
Here the artist liked to spend time, so the atmosphere was very familiar to him. This is what the cafe looks like in real life:
Cafe-cabaret "Folies-Bergere" in Paris today 
Cafe-cabaret "Folies-Bergere" in Paris today (interior) Girl real and looking glass
The main mystery lies in the difference between how the bar and the saleswoman look in the foreground of the picture compared to how they appear in the rear mirror.
Pay attention to how thoughtful and even sad the saleswoman is. She even seems to have tears in her eyes. In a variety show setting, she is supposed to smile and flirt with visitors rather.
This, by the way, is what happens in the reflection of the mirror. The girl leaned slightly towards the male customer, and judging by the slight distance between them, their conversation is intimate.
Edward Mane. Bar at the Folies Bergère (detail). 1882 Courtauld Institute of Art, London. Unusual painting signature
The bottles on the bar also differ in their arrangement from those displayed in the mirror.
By the way, Manet put the date of painting and his signature right on one of the bottles (the leftmost bottle of rose wine): Manet. 1882.
Edward Mane. Bar at the Folies Bergère (detail). 1882 Courtauld Institute of Art, London. What did Manet want to tell us with these riddles? Why is the girl in front of us even a figure different from the one displayed in the mirror? Why do objects on the bar change their position in the reflection?
Who posed for Manet?
The artist was posed by a real saleswoman named Suson from the Folies Bergère cafe. The girl was well acquainted with Manet. 2 years before writing the original painting, he painted her portrait.
It was common practice for artists to have a portrait of a model in case she refused to pose. To always be able to finish the picture.
Edward Mane. Model for the painting “Bar at the Folies Bergère”. 1880 Museum of Art in the Palace of the Dukes of Burgundy, Dijon, France. Perhaps Suson shared her life story with Manet, and Manet decided to portray her inner state and the role of a coquette that she is forced to play at the bar?
Or maybe what is happening in front of us is captured in the present tense, and in the reflection - the past of the girl, so the image of the objects is different?
If we continue this fantasy, we can assume that in the past the girl became too close to the gentleman depicted. And she was in position. It is known that saleswomen in such variety shows were called girls who “serve both drinks and love.”
The master, of course, did not begin to break his legal marriage because of the girl. And as often happens in such stories, the girl was alone in her arms with a child.
She has to work to somehow survive. Hence the sadness and sadness in her eyes.
X-ray of a painting
We can see another unusual and hidden detail of the picture thanks to an x-ray. It can be seen that in the original version of the painting, the girl keeps her arms crossed on her stomach.
Plot
Most of the canvas is occupied by a mirror. It is not only a piece of furniture that gives depth to the picture, but is actively involved in the plot. In his reflection, we see what happens to the main character in reality: noise, the play of lights, a man addressing her. The same thing that Manet shows as reality is the world of Suzon's dreams: she is immersed in her thoughts, detached from the bustle of the cabaret - as if the surrounding nativity scene does not concern her at all. Reality and dream changed places.
sketch of a painting
The reflection of the barmaid is different from her real body. In the mirror, the girl seems fuller, she leaned towards the man, listening to him. The client, on the other hand, considers as a product not only what is displayed on the counter, but also the girl herself. This is hinted at by bottles of champagne: they belong in a bucket of ice, but Manet left them so that we can see how their shape is similar to the figure of a girl. You can buy a bottle, you can buy a glass, or you can also the one who will uncork this bottle for you.
The bar counter resembles still lifes in the vanitas genre, which was distinguished by a moralistic mood and reminded that everything worldly is transient and perishable. Fruit - a symbol of the fall, a rose - carnal pleasures, bottles - decline and weakness, withering flowers - death and fading beauty. Beer bottles with Bass labels say that the British were frequent guests in this establishment.
Bar at the Folies Bergère, 1881
Electric lighting, so brightly and clearly written out in the picture, is perhaps the first such image. Such lamps at that time only became part of everyday life.
Context
Folies Bergère is a place that reflected the spirit of the time, the spirit of the new Paris. These were cafe-concerts, decently dressed men and indecently dressed women flocked here. In the company of the ladies of the demimonde, the gentlemen drank and ate. In the meantime, a performance was taking place on the stage, the numbers succeeded each other. Decent women in such establishments could not appear.
By the way, the Folies-Bergere was opened under the name of Folies-Trevize - this hinted to customers that “in the foliage of Trevize” (as the name is translated) you can hide from prying eyes and indulge in fun and pleasure. Guy de Maupassant called the local barmaids "sellers of drinks and love."
Folies Bergère, 1880
Manet was a regular at the Folies Bergère, but he painted the picture not in the cafe-concert itself, but in the studio. In the cabaret, he made several sketches, Suzon (by the way, she really worked in a bar) and a friend, military artist Henri Dupré, posed in the studio. The rest was restored from memory.
The Bar at the Folies Bergère was the last large painting by the artist, who died a year after it was completed. Needless to say, the public saw only inconsistencies, shortcomings, accused Manet of amateurism and considered his canvas at least strange?
The fate of the artist
Manet, who belonged to high society, was enfant terrible. He did not want to learn anything, success was mediocre in everything. The father was disappointed with the behavior of his son. And having learned about his craving for painting and the ambitions of the artist, he was completely on the verge of disaster.
A compromise was found: Edward went on a voyage, which was supposed to help the young man prepare for admission to the naval school (where, I must say, he could not get the first time). However, Manet returned from a voyage to Brazil not with the makings of a sailor, but with sketches and sketches. This time, the father, who liked these works, was supportive of his son's passion and blessed him for the life of an artist.
, 1863
Early works spoke of Manet as promising, but he lacked his own style, plots. Edward soon focused on what he knew and loved most - the life of Paris. Walking, Manet made sketches of scenes from life. Such sketches were not perceived by contemporaries as serious painting, believing that such drawings were suitable only for illustrations of magazines and reports. This would later be called Impressionism. In the meantime, Manet, along with like-minded people - Pissarro, Cezanne, Monet, Renoir, Degas - are proving their right to free creativity within the framework of the Batignolles school they created.
, 1863
Some semblance of confession to Manet appeared in the 1890s. His paintings began to be acquired in private and public collections. However, by that time the artist was no longer alive.
Today we will talk about the painting by Edouard Manet BAR IN FOLY-BERGERRE 1882, which has become one of the famous masterpieces of world art.
In 1881, in the French Salon, E. Manet was awarded the long-awaited second award for a portrait of a lion hunter. Pertuise. After that, Manet becomes out of competition and can exhibit his paintings, without any permission from the jury of the Salon.
The long-awaited glory comes, but his illness progresses simply inexorably and he knows about it and therefore, longing gnaws at him.
In September 1879, Manet suffered his first acute attack of rheumatism. It soon turned out that he was sick with ataxia - a violation of coordination of movements. The disease progressed rapidly, limiting the creative possibilities of the artist. Mane tries to resist a serious illness. Can't he overcome the disease?
WORK ON THE PICTURE.
Manet decides to gather all his strength and will, they are still trying to bury him early. He can be seen in the cafe "New Athens", in the cafe Bad, at Tortoni, at the Folies Bergère and at his friends. He always tries to joke and be ironic, has fun about his "weaknesses" and jokes about his leg.
He decides to implement his new idea: to draw a scene from everyday Parisian life and depict the view of the famous Folies Bergère bar, in which the lovely girl Suzon stands behind the counter, in front of numerous bottles. The girl is known by many regular visitors to the bar.
The painting "Bar at the Folies Bergère" is a work of extraordinary courage and picturesque subtlety: a blond girl stands behind the bar, behind her is a large mirror, which reflects the large hall of the institution with the audience sitting in it. She has an ornament on a black velvet around her neck, her gaze is cold, she is bewitchingly motionless, she looks indifferently at those around her.
This complex plot of the canvas is moving forward with great difficulty.
The artist struggles with it and remakes it many times. In early May 1882, Manet completes the painting and becomes happy contemplating it in the Salon. No one laughs at his paintings anymore, all his paintings are considered with great seriousness, they begin to argue about them as real works of art.
He created his last work, Bar at the Folies Bergère, as if saying goodbye to the life that he so cherished, admired so much and thought about a lot. The work absorbed everything that the artist had been looking for and finding for so long in an unremarkable life.
The best images are woven together to be embodied in this young girl who stands in a noisy Parisian tavern. In this institution, people seek joy by contacting their own kind, seeming fun and laughter reign here, a young and sensitive master reveals the image of a young life that is immersed in sadness and loneliness.
It is hard to believe that this work was written by a dying artist, to whom any movement of the hand caused pain and suffering. But even before his death, Edouard Manet remains a real fighter. He had to go through a difficult life path before he discovered the true beauty that he had been looking for all his life and found it in ordinary people, finding in their souls the inner wealth to which he gave his heart.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PICTURE
The canvas depicts one of the most famous cabarets in Paris, the end of the nineteenth century. This is the artist's favorite place.
Why did he love being there so much? The vibrant life of the capital was Manet's preference over the calm everyday regularity. He felt at this cabaret, better than at home.
Sketches and blanks for the picture, apparently, Manet did right in the bar. This bar was on the ground floor of the variety show. Sitting to the right of the stage, the artist began to make blanks for the canvas. After, he turned to the barmaid and his good friend, asking him to pose for him in his studio.
The basis of the composition was to be a friend of Manet and a barmaid, facing each other. They must be passionate about communicating with each other. The sketches found by Manet confirm this idea of the master.
But Manet decided to make the scene a little more significant than it was. In the background, there was a mirror reflecting the crowds of people filling the bar. In front of all these people, there was a bartender, she was thinking about her own, being at the counter in the bar. Although there is fun and noise around, the barmaid does not care about the crowd of visitors, she is hovering in her own thoughts. But on the right you can see, as if her own reflection, only she is talking with one visitor. How to understand it?
Apparently, the picture in the mirror is the events of the past minutes, but in reality what is depicted is that the girl thought about the conversation that took place a few minutes ago.
If you look at the bottles on the marble bar counter, you will notice that their reflection in the mirror does not match the original. The reflection of the barmaid is also unrealistic. She looks directly at the viewer, while in the mirror she is facing the man. All these inconsistencies make the viewer wonder if Manet depicted the real or imaginary world.
Although the picture is very simple in plot, it makes each viewer think and think of something of their own. Manet conveyed the contrast between a cheerful crowd and a lonely girl in the middle of the crowd.
Also in the picture you can see a society of artists, with their muses, aesthetes and their ladies. These people are in the left corner on the canvas. One woman is holding binoculars. This reflects the essence of a society that wants to look at others and expose itself to them. At the top left corner you can see the legs of the acrobat. Both the acrobat and the crowd of people having fun cannot, brighten up the loneliness and sadness of the barmaid.
The date and signature of the master is displayed on the label of one of the bottles, which is in the lower left corner.
The peculiarity of this painting by Manet, in its deep meaning, many symbols, and secrecy. Usually the paintings of the artist did not differ in such characteristics. The same picture conveys many depths of human thoughts. In the cabaret there are people of different backgrounds and status. But all people are equal in their desire to have fun and have a good time.
Text with illustrations and discussion of the painting.http://maxpark.com/community/6782/content/3023062
The painting by Jacques Louis David "The Oath of the Horatii" is a turning point in the history of European painting. Stylistically, it still belongs to classicism; it is a style oriented towards Antiquity, and at first glance this orientation is retained by David. The Oath of the Horatii is based on the story of how the Roman patriots, the three brothers Horace, were chosen to fight against the representatives of the hostile city of Alba Longa, the brothers Curiatii. Titus Livius and Diodorus Siculus have this story; Pierre Corneille wrote a tragedy on its plot.
“But it is precisely the oath of the Horatii that is missing from these classical texts.<...>It is David who turns the oath into the central episode of the tragedy. The old man is holding three swords. He stands in the center, he represents the axis of the picture. To his left are three sons merging into one figure, to his right are three women. This picture is amazingly simple. Before David, classicism, for all its orientation towards Raphael and Greece, could not find such a harsh, simple masculine language for expressing civic values. David seemed to hear what Diderot was saying, who did not have time to see this canvas: “You must write as they said in Sparta.”
Ilya Doronchenkov
In the time of David, Antiquity first became tangible through the archaeological discovery of Pompeii. Before him, Antiquity was the sum of the texts of ancient authors - Homer, Virgil and others - and a few dozen or hundreds of imperfectly preserved sculptures. Now it has become tangible, down to furniture and beads.
“But none of that is in David's picture. In it, Antiquity is strikingly reduced not so much to the surroundings (helmets, irregular swords, togas, columns), but to the spirit of primitive furious simplicity.
Ilya Doronchenkov
David carefully staged the appearance of his masterpiece. He painted and exhibited it in Rome, garnering enthusiastic criticism there, and then sent a letter to a French patron. In it, the artist reported that at some point he stopped painting for the king and began to paint it for himself, and, in particular, decided to make it not square, as required for the Paris Salon, but rectangular. As the artist expected, the rumors and the letter fueled public excitement, the painting was booked into an advantageous place at the already opened Salon.
“And so, belatedly, the picture is put into place and stands out as the only one. If it were square, it would be hung in a row of others. And by changing the size, David turned it into a unique one. It was a very powerful artistic gesture. On the one hand, he declared himself as the main one in creating the canvas. On the other hand, he riveted everyone's attention to this picture.
Ilya Doronchenkov
The picture has another important meaning, which makes it a masterpiece for all time:
“This canvas does not appeal to the individual - it refers to the person standing in the ranks. This is a team. And this is a command to a person who first acts and then thinks. David very correctly showed two non-intersecting, absolutely tragically separated worlds - the world of acting men and the world of suffering women. And this juxtaposition - very energetic and beautiful - shows the horror that actually stands behind the story of the Horatii and behind this picture. And since this horror is universal, then the "Oath of the Horatii" will not leave us anywhere.
Ilya Doronchenkov
Abstract
In 1816, the French frigate Medusa was wrecked off the coast of Senegal. 140 passengers left the brig on a raft, but only 15 escaped; they had to resort to cannibalism in order to survive the 12-day wandering on the waves. A scandal erupted in French society; the incompetent captain, a royalist by conviction, was found guilty of the disaster.
“For liberal French society, the catastrophe of the frigate Medusa, the sinking of the ship, which for a Christian person symbolizes the community (first the church, and now the nation), has become a symbol, a very bad sign of the beginning of a new Restoration regime.”
Ilya Doronchenkov
In 1818, the young artist Théodore Géricault, looking for a worthy subject, read the book of the survivors and set to work on his painting. In 1819, the painting was exhibited at the Paris Salon and became a hit, a symbol of romanticism in painting. Géricault quickly abandoned his intention to portray the most seductive scene of cannibalism; he did not show stabbing, despair, or the very moment of salvation.
“Gradually, he chose the only right moment. This is the moment of maximum hope and maximum uncertainty. This is the moment when the people who survived on the raft first see the Argus brig on the horizon, which first passed the raft (he did not notice it).
And only then, going on a collision course, stumbled upon him. In the sketch, where the idea has already been found, Argus is noticeable, but in the picture it turns into a small dot on the horizon, disappearing, which attracts the eye, but, as it were, does not exist.”Ilya Doronchenkov
Gericault renounces naturalism: instead of emaciated bodies, he has beautiful courageous athletes in his picture. But this is not idealization, this is universalization: the picture is not about specific Meduza passengers, it is about everyone.
“Géricault scatters the dead in the foreground. He did not invent it: the French youth raved about the dead and wounded bodies. It excited, hit on the nerves, destroyed conventions: a classicist cannot show the ugly and terrible, but we will. But these corpses have another meaning. Look at what is happening in the middle of the picture: there is a storm, there is a funnel into which the eye is drawn. And over the bodies, the viewer, standing right in front of the picture, steps onto this raft. We are all there."
Ilya Doronchenkov
Géricault's painting works in a new way: it is addressed not to an army of spectators, but to every person, everyone is invited to the raft. And the ocean is not just an ocean of lost hopes in 1816. This is the destiny of man.
Abstract
By 1814, France was tired of Napoleon, and the arrival of the Bourbons was received with relief. However, many political freedoms were abolished, the Restoration began, and by the end of the 1820s, the younger generation began to realize the ontological mediocrity of power.
“Eugène Delacroix belonged to that stratum of the French elite that rose under Napoleon and was pushed aside by the Bourbons. Nevertheless, he was favored: he received a gold medal for his first painting at the Salon, Dante's Boat, in 1822. And in 1824, he made the painting “Massacre on Chios”, depicting ethnic cleansing, when the Greek population of the island of Chios was deported and destroyed during the Greek War of Independence. This is the first sign of political liberalism in painting, which touched still very distant countries.
Ilya Doronchenkov
In July 1830, Charles X passed several laws severely restricting political freedoms and sent troops to sack the printing press of an opposition newspaper. But the Parisians responded by shooting, the city was covered with barricades, and during the "Three Glorious Days" the Bourbon regime fell.
The famous painting by Delacroix, dedicated to the revolutionary events of 1830, shows different social strata: a dandy in a top hat, a tramp boy, a worker in a shirt. But the main one, of course, is a beautiful young woman with bare breasts and a shoulder.
“Delacroix succeeds here with something that almost never happens with artists of the 19th century, who are thinking more and more realistically. He manages in one picture - very pathetic, very romantic, very sonorous - to combine reality, physically tangible and brutal (look at the corpses in the foreground beloved by romantics) and symbols. Because this full-blooded woman is, of course, Freedom itself. Political development since the 18th century has made it necessary for artists to visualize what cannot be seen. How can you see freedom? Christian values are conveyed to a person through something very human - through the life of Christ and his suffering. And such political abstractions as freedom, equality, fraternity have no shape. And now Delacroix, perhaps the first and, as it were, not the only one who, in general, successfully coped with this task: we now know what freedom looks like.
Ilya Doronchenkov
One of the political symbols in the painting is the Phrygian cap on the girl's head, a permanent heraldic symbol of democracy. Another talking motif is nakedness.
“Nudity has long been associated with naturalness and nature, and in the 18th century this association was forced. The history of the French Revolution even knows a unique performance, when a naked French theater actress portrayed nature in Notre Dame Cathedral. And nature is freedom, it is naturalness. And that's what, it turns out, this tangible, sensual, attractive woman means. It signifies natural liberty."
Ilya Doronchenkov
Although this painting made Delacroix famous, it was soon removed from view for a long time, and it is clear why. The spectator standing in front of her finds herself in the position of those who are attacked by Freedom, who are attacked by the revolution. It is very uncomfortable to look at the unstoppable movement that will crush you.
Abstract
On May 2, 1808, an anti-Napoleonic rebellion broke out in Madrid, the city was in the hands of the protesters, but by the evening of the 3rd, mass executions of rebels were taking place in the vicinity of the Spanish capital. These events soon led to a guerrilla war that lasted six years. When it is over, two paintings will be commissioned from the painter Francisco Goya to commemorate the uprising. The first is "The uprising of May 2, 1808 in Madrid."
“Goya really depicts the moment the attack began - that first Navajo strike that started the war. It is this compactness of the moment that is extremely important here. He seems to bring the camera closer, from the panorama he moves to an exceptionally close plan, which also did not exist to such an extent before him. There is another exciting thing: the feeling of chaos and stabbing is extremely important here. There is no person here that you feel sorry for. There are victims and there are killers. And these murderers with bloodshot eyes, Spanish patriots, in general, are engaged in butchering.
Ilya Doronchenkov
In the second picture, the characters change places: those who are cut in the first picture, in the second picture, those who cut them are shot. And the moral ambivalence of the street fight is replaced by moral clarity: Goya is on the side of those who rebelled and die.
“The enemies are now divorced. On the right are those who will live. It's a series of people in uniform with guns, exactly the same, even more the same than David's Horace brothers. Their faces are invisible, and their shakos make them look like machines, like robots. These are not human figures. They stand out in a black silhouette in the darkness of the night against the backdrop of a lantern flooding a small clearing.
On the left are those who die. They move, swirl, gesticulate, and for some reason it seems that they are taller than their executioners. Although the main, central character - a Madrid man in orange pants and a white shirt - is on his knees. He is still taller, he is a little on a hillock.
Ilya Doronchenkov
The dying rebel stands in the pose of Christ, and for greater persuasiveness, Goya depicts stigmata on his palms. In addition, the artist makes you go through a difficult experience all the time - look at the last moment before the execution. Finally, Goya changes the understanding of the historical event. Before him, an event was portrayed by its ritual, rhetorical side; in Goya, an event is an instant, a passion, a non-literary cry.
In the first picture of the diptych, it can be seen that the Spaniards are not slaughtering the French: the riders falling under the horse's feet are dressed in Muslim costumes.
The fact is that in the troops of Napoleon there was a detachment of Mamelukes, Egyptian cavalrymen.
“It would seem strange that the artist turns Muslim fighters into a symbol of the French occupation. But this allows Goya to turn a contemporary event into a link in the history of Spain. For any nation that forged its self-consciousness during the Napoleonic Wars, it was extremely important to realize that this war is part of an eternal war for its values. And such a mythological war for the Spanish people was the Reconquista, the reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula from the Muslim kingdoms. Thus, Goya, while remaining faithful to documentary, modernity, puts this event in connection with the national myth, forcing us to realize the struggle of 1808 as the eternal struggle of the Spaniards for the national and Christian.
Ilya Doronchenkov
The artist managed to create an iconographic formula of execution. Every time his colleagues - be it Manet, Dix or Picasso - turned to the topic of execution, they followed Goya.
Abstract
The pictorial revolution of the 19th century, even more tangibly than in the event picture, took place in the landscape.
“The landscape completely changes the optics. Man changes his scale, man experiences himself in a different way in the world. A landscape is a realistic depiction of what is around us, with a sense of moisture-laden air and everyday details in which we are immersed. Or it can be a projection of our experiences, and then in the play of a sunset or in a joyful sunny day we see the state of our soul. But there are striking landscapes that belong to both modes. And it's very hard to know, really, which one is dominant."
Ilya Doronchenkov
This duality is clearly manifested by the German artist Caspar David Friedrich: his landscapes both tell us about the nature of the Baltic, and at the same time represent a philosophical statement. There is a lingering sense of melancholy in Friedrich's landscapes; a person rarely penetrates them beyond the background and usually turns his back to the viewer.
In his last painting, Ages of Life, a family is depicted in the foreground: children, parents, an old man. And further, behind the spatial gap - the sunset sky, the sea and sailboats.
“If we look at how this canvas is built, we will see a striking echo between the rhythm of human figures in the foreground and the rhythm of sailboats in the sea. Here are tall figures, here are low figures, here are big sailboats, here are boats under sail. Nature and sailboats - this is what is called the music of the spheres, it is eternal and does not depend on man. The man in the foreground is his finite being. The sea in Friedrich is very often a metaphor for otherness, death. But death for him, a believer, is a promise of eternal life, about which we do not know. These people in the foreground - small, clumsy, not very attractively written - follow the rhythm of a sailboat with their rhythm, as a pianist repeats the music of the spheres. This is our human music, but it all rhymes with the very music that for Friedrich fills nature. Therefore, it seems to me that in this canvas Friedrich promises - not an afterlife paradise, but that our finite being is still in harmony with the universe.
Ilya Doronchenkov
Abstract
After the French Revolution, people realized that they had a past. The 19th century, through the efforts of romantic aesthetes and positivist historians, created the modern idea of history.
“The 19th century created history painting as we know it. Non-distracted Greek and Roman heroes, acting in an ideal environment, guided by ideal motives. The history of the 19th century becomes theatrical and melodramatic, it approaches man, and we are now able to empathize not with great deeds, but with misfortunes and tragedies. Each European nation created a history for itself in the 19th century, and in constructing history, it, in general, created its own portrait and plans for the future. In this sense, European historical painting of the 19th century is terribly interesting to study, although, in my opinion, it did not leave, almost did not leave truly great works. And among these great works, I see one exception, which we Russians can rightly be proud of. This is Vasily Surikov's "Morning of the Streltsy Execution".
Ilya Doronchenkov
19th-century history painting, oriented towards external plausibility, usually tells of a single hero who directs history or fails. Surikov's painting here is a striking exception. Her hero is a crowd in colorful outfits, which takes up almost four-fifths of the picture; because of this, the picture seems to be startlingly disorganized. Behind the live swirling crowd, part of which will soon die, stands the colorful, agitated St. Basil's Cathedral. Behind the frozen Peter, a line of soldiers, a line of gallows - a line of battlements of the Kremlin wall. The picture is held together by the duel of the views of Peter and the red-bearded archer.
“A lot can be said about the conflict between society and the state, the people and the empire. But it seems to me that this thing has some more meanings that make it unique. Vladimir Stasov, a propagandist of the work of the Wanderers and a defender of Russian realism, who wrote a lot of superfluous things about them, spoke very well about Surikov. He called paintings of this kind "choral". Indeed, they lack one hero - they lack one engine. The people are the driving force. But in this picture the role of the people is very clearly visible. Joseph Brodsky in his Nobel lecture perfectly said that the real tragedy is not when the hero dies, but when the choir dies.
Ilya Doronchenkov
Events take place in Surikov's paintings as if against the will of their characters - and in this the concept of the artist's history is obviously close to Tolstoy's.
“Society, people, nation in this picture seem to be divided. Soldiers of Peter in a uniform that seems black, and archers in white are contrasted as good and evil. What connects these two unequal parts of the composition? This is an archer in a white shirt, going to execution, and a soldier in uniform, who supports him by the shoulder. If we mentally remove everything that surrounds them, we will never be able to assume that this person is being led to execution. They are two buddies who are returning home, and one supports the other in a friendly and warm manner. When Petrusha Grinev was hanged by the Pugachevites in The Captain's Daughter, they said: “Don't knock, don't knock,” as if they really wanted to cheer him up. This feeling that a people divided by the will of history is at the same time fraternal and united is the amazing quality of Surikov’s canvas, which I also don’t know anywhere else.”
Ilya Doronchenkov
Abstract
In painting, size matters, but not every subject can be depicted on a large canvas. Different pictorial traditions depicted the villagers, but most often not in huge paintings, but this is precisely the “Funeral at Ornans” by Gustave Courbet. Ornan is a prosperous provincial town, where the artist himself comes from.
“Courbet moved to Paris but did not become part of the artistic establishment. He did not receive an academic education, but he had a powerful hand, a very tenacious eye and great ambition. He always felt like a provincial, and he was best at home, in Ornan. But he lived almost all his life in Paris, fighting with the art that was already dying, fighting with the art that idealizes and talks about the general, about the past, about the beautiful, not noticing the present. Such art, which rather praises, which rather delights, as a rule, finds a very large demand. Courbet was, indeed, a revolutionary in painting, although now this revolutionary nature of him is not very clear to us, because he writes life, he writes prose. The main thing that was revolutionary in him was that he stopped idealizing his nature and began to write it exactly as he sees, or as he believed that he sees.
Ilya Doronchenkov
About fifty people are depicted in a giant picture almost in full growth. All of them are real persons, and experts have identified almost all the participants in the funeral. Courbet painted his countrymen, and they were pleased to get into the picture exactly as they are.
“But when this painting was exhibited in 1851 in Paris, it created a scandal. She went against everything that the Parisian public was used to at that moment. She offended the artists with the lack of a clear composition and rough, dense impasto painting, which conveys the materiality of things, but does not want to be beautiful. She frightened off the ordinary person by the fact that he could not really understand who it was. Striking was the disintegration of communications between the audience of provincial France and the Parisians. The Parisians took the image of this respectable wealthy crowd as the image of the poor. One of the critics said: “Yes, this is a disgrace, but this is the disgrace of the province, and Paris has its own disgrace.” Under the ugliness, in fact, was understood the ultimate truthfulness.
Ilya Doronchenkov
Courbet refused to idealize, which made him a true avant-garde artist of the 19th century. He focuses on French popular prints, and on a Dutch group portrait, and on antique solemnity. Courbet teaches us to perceive modernity in its originality, in its tragedy and in its beauty.
“French salons knew images of hard peasant labor, poor peasants. But the image mode was generally accepted. The peasants needed to be pitied, the peasants needed to be sympathized with. It was a view from above. A person who sympathizes is, by definition, in a priority position. And Courbet deprived his spectator of the possibility of such patronizing empathy. His characters are majestic, monumental, they ignore their viewers, and they do not allow you to establish such a contact with them that makes them part of the familiar world, they break stereotypes very powerfully.
Ilya Doronchenkov
Abstract
The 19th century did not love itself, preferring to look for beauty in something else, be it Antiquity, the Middle Ages or the East. Charles Baudelaire was the first to learn to see the beauty of modernity, and it was embodied in painting by artists whom Baudelaire was not destined to see: for example, Edgar Degas and Edouard Manet.
“Manet is a provocateur. Manet is at the same time a brilliant painter, whose charm of colors, colors that are very paradoxically combined, makes the viewer not ask himself obvious questions. If we look closely at his paintings, we will often be forced to admit that we do not understand what brought these people here, what they are doing next to each other, why these objects are connected on the table. The simplest answer is: Manet is primarily a painter, Manet is primarily an eye. He is interested in the combination of colors and textures, and the logical conjugation of objects and people is the tenth thing. Such pictures often confuse the viewer who is looking for content, who is looking for stories. Mane does not tell stories. He could have remained such an amazingly accurate and refined optical apparatus if he had not created his latest masterpiece already in those years when he was possessed by a fatal disease.
Ilya Doronchenkov
The painting "The Bar at the Folies Bergère" was exhibited in 1882, at first earned ridicule from critics, and then was quickly recognized as a masterpiece. Its theme is the cafe-concert, a striking phenomenon of Parisian life in the second half of the century. It seems that Manet vividly and reliably captured the life of the Folies Bergère.
“But when we start to look closely at what Manet did in his picture, we will understand that there are a huge number of inconsistencies that are subconsciously disturbing and, in general, do not receive a clear resolution. The girl that we see is a saleswoman, she must, with her physical attractiveness, make visitors stop, flirt with her and order more drinks. Meanwhile, she does not flirt with us, but looks through us. There are four bottles of champagne on the table, warm, but why not on ice? In mirror image, these bottles are not on the same edge of the table as they are in the foreground. The glass with roses is seen from a different angle from which all the other objects on the table are seen. And the girl in the mirror does not look exactly like the girl who looks at us: she is stouter, she has more rounded shapes, she leaned towards the visitor. In general, she behaves as the one we are looking at should behave.
Ilya Doronchenkov
Feminist criticism drew attention to the fact that the girl with her outlines resembles a bottle of champagne standing on the counter. This is a well-aimed observation, but hardly exhaustive: the melancholy of the picture, the psychological isolation of the heroine oppose a straightforward interpretation.
“These optical plot and psychological riddles of the picture, which seem to have no definite answer, make us approach it again and again each time and ask these questions, subconsciously saturated with that feeling of beautiful, sad, tragic, everyday modern life, which Baudelaire dreamed of and which forever left Manet before us."
Ilya Doronchenkov
The legendary cabaret Folies Bergère, which will soon celebrate its 150th anniversary, is located in the heart of Paris near Montmartre. The cabaret building, built by the architect Plumre on the model of the Alhambra Theater in London, is easily recognizable thanks to a large panel with a dancer on the facade.
Folies Bergère - a modern platform for creativity
Although the premises of the Folies Bergère have long been in need of some renovation and redecoration, this by no means reduces the number of its spectators, but rather, on the contrary, adds atmosphere and color. Numerous visitors admire the shimmering gold walls, the expensive interior of the hall in yellow and blue tones and the luxurious staircase leading to the auditorium.
One of the oldest Parisian cabarets invariably follows its traditions: concerts of musical groups, vibrant dance shows, performances and comedians are still regularly held here. The Folies Bergère's repertoire includes a dozen dynamic performances, among which the dance and circus show with elements of eroticism Ohlala, the musical play Jersey Boys and the show of magicians The Illusionists are especially popular.
History of cabaret
The date of birth of Folies Bergère is considered to be May 1, 1869. It was then that at the peak of the popularity of the variety show in Paris, another institution was opened that won the hearts of the Parisian public. However, at that time the cabaret was called Folies Trevise and its name was due to rue Trevise, where the entrance for the employees of the institution was located. The change of name to Folies Bergère took place at the initiative of the Duke de Trevize. He was categorically against the fact that an institution of this kind bore his name, so the cabaret was renamed after the neighboring street rue Bergere. 
In addition to lunch, cabaret visitors paid separately for the performance, during which they could freely move around the hall, smoke and talk at their tables. The Folies Bergère had a relaxed atmosphere: with a glass of wine, the audience enjoyed dancing and gymnastic numbers, as well as performances by magicians. During the Franco-Prussian war, the cabaret was temporarily used for meetings, at which many famous personalities of that period performed.
The beginning of the stage of the dizzying success of the cabaret falls on 1871. After the entrepreneur Lyon Sari acquired the Folies Bergère, the institution's popularity skyrocketed. He organized a winter garden and a spacious hall in the concert hall. In 1886, the artistic director of the cabaret, Edouard Marchand, came up with a new performance format for the famous cabaret - the music hall revue. The show included not only dance elements, but also performances by singers and comedians. Between numbers, entertainers performed on stage with short monologues and parodies of politicians. 
Against the backdrop of the growing popularity of the cabaret, it was decided to almost double the size of the auditorium and decorate the façade with an Art Deco panel designed by the sculptor Pico.
Celebrities in the Folies Bergère
The success of the cabaret is evidenced by the fact that the famous artist Edouard Manet dedicated one of his works to him. The famous painting Bar at the Folies Bergère, painted in 1881, depicts the waitress Suzon, and behind her is a large mirror in which numerous visitors are visible.
The Music Hall has become a launching pad for many famous artists. At different times, the singer-actor Maurice Chevalier, the actor Jean Gabin, the singer Mistenguette, the French writer Colette and the great Charlie Chaplin himself visited its stage. African-American Josephine Baker, a talented jazz singer and dancer, brought the institution immense popularity at the beginning of the last century, having won the nickname “black pearl” among the audience. 
Comedian Benny Hill, mime actor Marcel Marceau, singers Frank Sinatra, Yves Montand, Elton John and many other celebrities have also performed here.
Until now, Folies Bergère continues to be popular among connoisseurs of the classic cabaret atmosphere, attracting visitors with vibrant dance shows and musical performances.
How to get there
Address: 32 Rue Richer, Paris 75009Telephone: +33 1 44 79 98 60
Website: www.foliesbergere.com
Metro: Cadet
Bus: Provence - Faubourg Montmartre, Petites Ecuries
Updated: 08/03/2016
