print
- Museum number
- 1949,0411.3346
- Title
-
Object: L'Exécution de Maximilien
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Object: Maximilien d'Autriche, empereur du Mexique, le 19 juin, 1867
- Description
-
The execution of the emperor Maximilian and two companions, at left, before a firing squad. 1868
Lithograph on chine collé
- Production date
- 1868
- Dimensions
-
Height: 337 millimetres
-
Width: 440 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- (Text from 'From Manet to Toulouse-Lautrec', BM 1978, cat.15)
Maximilian, Archduke of Austria, was made Emperor of Mexico in 1863 largely through Napoleon III's machinations. Left defenceless by the withdrawal of French troops, he was shot by the Liberal army on 19 June 1867. The news caused a sensation in Europe, and Manet made five versions of the subject, four oils plus this lithograph, which does not correspond exactly with any of the paintings. The behaviour of Napoleon III throughout the Mexican episode was disgraceful; thus the very choice of this subject could not be other than an attack on his regime. Manet drove the point home by his dispassionate treatment of the subject, and by clothing the execution squad in uniforms very similar to those worn by the French army.
Not surprisingly Manet was informed that if he insisted on presenting the picture for the Salon of 1869, it had 'toutes les chances pour ne point être admis'. To counter this he made the lithograph for wide public circulation. But when the printer Lemercier registered the print at the Dépot Légal, he was immediately ordered to suppress it, even though it did not carry any title. Manet then had a quarrel with the printer Lemercier who preferred to destroy the stone rather than return it to him. The lithograph was first published after Manet's death, in 1884.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
1978 Mar-Oct, BM, From Manet to Toulouse-Lautrec cat. no.15
2000 May-July, Manchester, Whitworth Art Gallery, Endings
2003/4 Sep-Jan, Tarragona, Sala Tarragona, Masters of Printmaking from BM
2004 Feb-April, Palma, Fundacio 'la Caixa', Masters of Printmaking from BM
2004 April-July, Lleida, Fundacio 'la Caixa', Masters of Printmaking from BM
- Acquisition date
- 1949
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1949,0411.3346
