Manet and the Object of Painting

In this encounter between one of the twentieth century's greatest philosophical minds and an artist fundamental to our understanding of the development of modern art, Michel Foucault explores Edouard Manet's importance in the overthrow of traditional values in painting. Originally delivered as a lecture in Tunis in 1971, here translated into English for the first time, the text takes the form of a commentary on thirteen of Manet's paintings. For Foucault, the connection between visual art and power is clear. Far from being an insular and bourgeois pursuit, he saw painting as a place where power's insidious workings were disclosed and therefore to be challenged. At the same time, this work is part of the larger history of representation that informs all Foucault's major works, a stage in the development of his concern for le regard or the gaze; a major feature of twentieth-century French phenomenology.