Why Edouard Manet's beloved muse has been compared to a "gorilla with green flesh": Mören's quiz

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Quiz Meuran is the muse of Edouard Manet. This red-haired woman became the model for the most iconic Impressionist paintings. "Breakfast on the Grass", "Gare Saint-Lazare", "Olympia", "Street Singer" and even the boy in "Flutist" - all this is her, Quiz Meuran. An unusually adorable girl has a confident look, petite stature and golden luxurious hair - because of this, the Quiz received the nickname "shrimp". The intellectuals of the time assumed that she was a simple courtesan, an artist's mistress, or maybe just a street swindler. But who was she really?

Biography

The artist and model were from completely different backgrounds. Edouard Manet was the son of a French judge who wanted to make his son a lawyer. After he convinced his father to let him join the fleet, young Manet found a kind captain who allowed him to paint in the sea (in the fleet, Manet was engaged in repainting wax skins on cheeses). In the end, the father gave in and allowed his son to study art, sending him to the workshop of Thomas Couture.

Much less is known about Quiz Meuran. The heroine of Montmartre was born in Paris in 1844 into a family of hardworking artisans. Quiz began working with Manet in 1862 at the age of 16. Perhaps the first meeting took place in the studio of Thomas Couture, for whom she worked as a model. Couture also gave painting lessons and, perhaps, it was there that she was able to develop her artistic talent. Another version says that Quiz and Edward could meet on the street near the Palace of Justice. Meuran first posed for Manet at the age of 18. It was The Street Singer. The quiz was also a muse for artists Edgar Degas, Puvis de Chavannes and Belgian master Alfred Stevens (rumored to have had a romantic relationship with the latter).

The quiz really had an extraordinary appearance. She was not stately or voluptuous, nor was she beautiful. But Manet must have seen something special in her, as Quiz has been his favorite model for over 10 years.

Artistic talent

Yes, Quiz is best known as Edouard Manet's favorite model. At the same time, she herself was an artist and even exhibited at the prestigious Paris Salon. Similar cases in history - when the muse was also an artist - are not rare. Suffice it to recall Dora Maar, Camille Claudel, Suzanne Valadon, and others. In addition to her artistic talent, Victorina also had a musical gift (she played the guitar and violin, and sometimes taught both instruments).

The quiz gravitated towards an academic style of painting foreign to Manet himself. In 1876, a rather ironic situation occurred: a self-portrait of Quiz Meuran was exhibited in the Salon. But Manet that year could not achieve recognition of his work and was not exhibited. Quiz canvases were displayed in the gallery in the same place where Manet's paintings were supposed to be. This irony could hardly have gone unnoticed. In the Salon of 1879, Quiz's "Nuremberg Townwoman in the 16th Century" hung in the same room where Manet's "Self-Portrait with Palette" hung. However, this did not affect the relationship of the two people in any way. The Paris Salon has hosted and exhibited Meuran's work 6 more times throughout her creative career.

Why is her fate called sad

Victoria Meuran had a notorious reputation. When Manet's painting Breakfast on the Grass was first presented at the 1863 exhibition, public reactions ranged from laughter to outright indignation. Olimpia turned out to be even more scandalous. This image of Quiz was ridiculed and compared to a female gorilla with green flesh. In the art of the 18th and 19th centuries, nude female bodies on canvases were valued only if they represented mythical goddesses and historical heroines. But the images presented by Victorina in the most famous paintings by Manet clearly belonged to modern Paris. Manet continued to use the Quiz as a model until the early 1870s (she later resumed her art studies and parted ways).

In August 1883, 4 months after Manet's death, Quiz turned to the artist's widow for financial help. Meuran claimed that years earlier, Manet had promised her a small reward for her work. But then she refused, saying that she would remind him of the offer if she needed money. “This time has come earlier than I expected,” the Quiz wrote to his widow. Madame Manet, who inherited most of her husband's paintings and organized their sale, ignored the girl's request.

For the last 20 years of her life, Quiz lived in a house in the suburbs of Paris with her friend Marie Dufour. In the records of the local population census, you can find information that the Quiz in the item about the profession indicated itself as an artist. Meuran died in 1927. After the death of her friend Dufour in 1930, the contents of the house were burned. All the creative heritage of the Quiz was lost with the exception of one work - "Palm Sunday".

Thus, the Quiz was not a classic professional model of the artist who could pose beautifully, depicting the nymphs and muses of antiquity. Nor was she a socialite whose life would be covered in newspaper columns. Quiz Meuran was simply a Parisian whose looks and ambitions made her a muse of painters and an independent artist. The most scandalous work with Victorina revolutionized French painting.