The Balcony
by MANET, Edouard, Oil on canvas, 170 x 125 cm
Seated in the foreground is Berthe Morisot. This is her impressive first appearance in Manet’s oeuvre. The composition has the hieratic frontality of Byzantine mosaics. Berthe is the unrivalled star, Manet having flattened the other characters in the background.
In this painting Manet drew on Goya’s Majas on Balcony.