Line in Front of the Butcher Shop
1870–71
Medium
Etching in warm black on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Image: 16.9 × 15 cm (6 11/16 × 5 15/16 in.); Plate: 23.6 × 15.8 cm (9 5/16 × 6 1/4 in.); Sheet: 26.7 × 17.8 cm (10 9/16 × 7 1/16 in.)
Classification
etching
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
103109
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
As a member of the National Guard during the Prussian siege of 1870, Edouard Manet witnessed the misery of wartime Paris. He wrote, "[The] butcher shops open only three times a week, and there are queues in front of their doors from four in the morning, and the last in line get nothing." The abstract patterns of arrayed umbrellas in this print recall the work of the Japanese printmaker Utagawa Hiroshige. The bayonet rising above the umbrellas, however, reveals the military presence required to c...