Rochefort's Escape
Édouard Manet·1881
Historical Context
Manet produced two paintings of Rochefort's escape from New Caledonia — one showing the rescue at sea, one the escape itself — based on the journalist's own account of rowing out into the Pacific with five companions to meet a waiting ship in 1874. Rochefort had been deported following the Paris Commune, and his escape was celebrated by republicans as a victory over imperial repression. Manet's political sympathy with Rochefort is evident in his choice to treat the episode with the grandeur of marine history painting, a genre he rarely entered.
Technical Analysis
A small open boat with dark figures occupies the middle ground of a vast, grey sea, the compositional emptiness emphasising the men's vulnerability. Manet renders the Atlantic swell with broad, overlapping strokes of grey-green, the boat reduced to a dark silhouette against the pale sea surface and overcast sky.
