Édouard Manet (1832–1883) was born in Paris on 23 January 1832 into a well-connected family. His father, Auguste, was a judge who expected his son to follow him into the law. Édouard chose painting instead, and studied under the academic painter Thomas Couture.
In 1863 the Salon rejected his Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe, and it was shown instead at the Salon des Refusés, the alternative exhibition Napoleon III set up after the jury turned away thousands of paintings. Two years later Olympia, a nude who looks straight back at the viewer, caused a scandal at the Salon itself. Both pictures now hang in the Musée d’Orsay.
Young painters saw Manet as their leader, and the novelist Émile Zola defended his work in print. Yet he never exhibited with the Impressionists. He declined to join their first exhibition in 1874, believing that a modern artist should win over the Salon rather than abandon it. His subjects came from the boulevards and cafés of Paris.
Official recognition arrived late. He received the Légion d’honneur in 1881, and in 1882 A Bar at the Folies-Bergère was shown at the Salon. He died in Paris on 30 April 1883, aged 51.