The Painting of Modern Life: Paris in the Art of Manet and his Followers

The Paris of the 1860s and 1870s was supposedly a brand-new city, equipped with boulevards, cafés, parks, and suburban pleasure grounds — the birthplace of those habits of commerce and leisure that constitute “modern life”. Questioning those who view Impressionism solely in terms of artistic technique, TJ Clark describes the painting of Manet, Degas, Seurat, and others as an attempt to give form to that modernity and seek out its typical representatives. The central question of The Painting of Modern Life is this: did modern painting as it came into being celebrate the consumer-oriented culture of the Paris of Napoleon III, or open it to critical scrutiny? It is Clark's cogently argued (and profusely illustrated) thesis that modern art emerged from these painter's attempts to represent this new city and its inhabitants. Concentrating on three of Manet's greatest works and Seurat's masterpiece, Clark traces the appearance and development of the artists' favorite themes and subjects, and the technical innovations that they employed to depict a way of life which, under its liberated, pleasure-seeking surface, was often awkward and anxious.