Olympia's Look

Betrayed, hurt, and lonely; Suzanne Manet’s life with Édouard Manet was anything but a fairytale. To portray this, Olympia’s Look by Susan Vreeland is set shortly after Édouard’s excruciating and sickening death from syphilis. Suzanne and her nephew look over Édouard’s paintings, this experience in itself could not be too pleasant for her. She was surrounded by lovely paintings of “the other women”, ones that her husband allegedly had affairs with. She was constantly battling her lack of trust in her husband --catching a model with a flirtatious note from Édouard didn’t help. Her pain was reflected in her own titles for some of Édouard’s masterpieces, including “Betrayal” and “Courtesan to half of Paris.” Although she had a reason to not trust her husband, she also appears to have struggled with her self esteem, scrutinizing a painting of herself, and gazing upon the painting of Olympia and desiring that same look of power that Olympia possesses and she lacks.

However, Suzanne’s underlying feelings for her husband are revealed in passages in Vreeland’s story. Reliving her time with Édouard, Suzanne thinks, “Would it have been any different if she hadn’t been the placid, tolerant Dutch wife wanting peace at any cost, turning a blind eye every time he burst into the apartment flushed and elated, passing it off as the joy he took in painting?” Although this passage doesn’t reinforce her love for Édouard it does exhibit Suzanne’s desire for his happiness. By not confronting him, it shows she cared for him and wanted his happiness, even at the cost of her own contentment. However, to say she was never happy with Édouard would be a lie, at the end of the story Suzanne makes a fire, and sits down in her late-husband’s chair; she relives the days of her happiness, saying, “A fine fire it was, full of satisfying crackles, just like the ones they had in the happy times in Brabant. She chuckled softly, remembering the funny, surprised look of Édouard’s face when the wind racing over the flat land had whisked his top hat on their wedding day and he went running down the dike road after it.” This story paints a picture of a content and happy couple, full of love and fondness for one another. Her longing to return to days like these reveals that Suzanne will always have a place for Édouard in her heart, even in the midst of unpleasant later memories.

Vreeland is an exceptional author using realistic facts and paintings to create a woman-Édouard Manet’s wife. Her interpretation of Suzanne’s character leads the reader into both the life of the wife and the famous painter. All the events that Suzanne experienced made her a hardened woman; however, a light shines through when she refers to Isabelle Lemonneir as Édouard’s collaborator. Although events of a husband having multiple affairs could scar a woman leading her to a life of depression and shame, at the end of the story Vreeland leads us to believe Suzanne will live a fulfilling life, with love in her heart for Édouard.

"Who is that Person" Annotated Bibliography

"Gustav Klimt: Mada Primavesi (1903-2000) (64.148)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000. 01 February 2009 http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/artn/ho_64.148.htm

This online resource reveals who the young girl in Gustav Klimt’s painting entitled Mada Primavesi really was. The portrait’s title refers to the child’s name. Both the elegance of the name and the beauty of the ornate dress lead the viewer to believe that she was born into the upper class. Although the article did not state outright that she is a wealthy child, it states that her father was a banker and an industrialist and that her mother was an actress. This fact explains her sophisticated dress and ornate headpiece for a girl only nine years in age. This source comes from The Metropolitan Museum of Art and very clear and concise when providing information about Klimt’s 1912 portrait of Mada Primavesi.

“Gustav Klimt Landscapes.” Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. 2002. 01 February 2009 http://www.clarkart.edu/exhibitions/klimt/klimt/bio.cfm.
This online source was very useful in giving an inside look on Klimt’s affect on art in his time (he lived from 1862 to 1918). Klimt’s works of art were usually very public, for example, he painted murals on very prominent buildings within cities. Being a figure in society’s eye, Klimt received a lot of criticism mostly for his realist and fantastical style before the 1900’s. The source leads me to believe that his mature style came only ten years before his death when he focused more on portraits (like that of Mada Primavesi). However, unlike his picture of Mada Primavesi many of his portraits were very erotic and also very controversial to the time.

Partch, Susanna. Gustav Klimt: Painter of Women. New York: Prestel-Verlag, 1994.
The pages of this book are not only filled with beautiful portraits, but also insight into the mastermind behind these works of art. Many of Klimt’s works were of women in the nude, sometimes portrayed erotically and other times in a serene and peaceful manner. Throughout his life Klimt was quite a womanizer, reportedly having affairs with many of his models, even while he maintained a steady relationship with Emilie Floge. He threw himself into his art and refused to marry Floge because he didn’t want anything to interfere with his painting. His works took many years, for example his portrait of Mada Primavesi took many pencil sketches before he was satisfied with the look of the painting. His final decision on the background gave the painting an innocent and decorative look to complement that of the nine year old Mada Primavesi.