Painting of the Month

Edouard Manet, 'Music in the Tuileries Gardens', 1862
Special Feature: Posing in the Park

This painting of a fashionably dressed crowd waiting to hear a concert in the Tuileries Gardens in Paris was Manet's first major painting showing urban life. Manet included himself on the extreme left of the painting, so that he is both observing the scene and part of it.

All the men wear black frock coats and most wear top hats. This was the uniform of modern life, with only slight variations - like the lighter trousers worn by the man in the centre - being permitted.

The painting includes several of the most prominent figures in the Paris arts world: the poet Charles Baudelaire, composer Jacques Offenbach, critic and writer Théophile Gautier, and Inspector of Museums Baron Taylor.

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