Marie Gicquel 14:20 pm, April 01, 2023
The Musée d'Orsay is hosting until 23rd July the exhibition "Manet/Degas" which brings together the two painters whose light of their contrasts forces us to take a new look at their real complicity. The curator of the exhibition confides in Europe 1.One painted the Olympia, the other the dancers. But the two artists, who frequented the same circles, hated each other. Their meeting feels like the beginning of a romantic comedy. Edouard Manet and Edgar Degas cross paths at the Louvre in front of a painting by Velázquez. They admire each other, appreciate each other, come from the same background, but their brushes get tangled after an argument.
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Degas paints Manet and his wife, but the painting does not please and Manet simply decides to cut the canvas. "The ambition of the exhibition was to show this relationship in its intimate and personal dimensions, but also, of course, all the consequences that it may have had in the work of the two artists," Isolde Pludermacher, curator of the exhibition, told Europe 1.
Representing modern life
Even distant, the two painters inspired each other, taking horse racing, beaches and portraits of Parisian women as the same subject. "They both made the choice to represent modern life," adds Isolde Pludermacher. "And that was really new. Especially in this way, they really stood out from contemporary production."
Today, the opening of the exhibition #ManetDegas!
Crossed views on two giants of the nineteenth century, to discover until July 23.
Booking highly recommended.
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— Musée d'Orsay (@MuseeOrsay) March 28, 2023
Their two self-portraits side by side, the line is finer in Degas, more impressionist in Manet. Orsay has succeeded in bringing together and reconciling these two masters for the happiness of the many visitors. The exhibition "Manet/Degas" is to be admired until July 23rd.