Edouard Manet, Le Dejeuner sur l'Herbe, Impressionism, 1863, Louvre, Paris, France.

Le Déjeuner sur L'Herbe ("Lunch on the Grass") was painted in 1863 by Edouard Manet and can be seen at the Musee d'Orsay in Paris. It's painted in oil, on canvas, and measures 81cm x 101cm. A smaller version can be seen in the Courtauld Institute Gallery in London.

This painting was first shown to the public at the Salon des Refuses in 1863 and its exhibition caused a furore. What upset the critics the most was Manet's audacity in "copying" the old masters, by parading vulgar modern figures. These were not nymphs and shepherds of myth, but modern Parisian city dwellers indulging their petit-bourgeois passion for picnicking in the country. The fuss helped establish Manet's public profile and promoted him to the status of hero in the eyes of younger painters.

In the foreground, three characters are seated on the grass: a naked woman and two men dressed like dandies. The woman, whose body is starkly lit, looks frankly in the direction of the viewer. The man on the right wears a flat hat with a tassel. The men seem to be engaged in conversation, ignoring the woman. In front of them, the clothes of the woman, a basket of fruit and a round loaf of bread are displayed as in a still life. In the background, another woman is draped in an almost transparent cloth, bathing in a small pond. Too large in comparison with the figures in the foreground, she seems to float.

The roughly painted backround lacks depth, giving the viewer the impression that the scene does not take place outdoors, but in a studio. The impression is reinforced by the use of broad "photographic" light, which casts almost no shadows: in fact, the lighting of the scene is inconsistent and unnatural. The hat the man wears was normally only for indoor use.

Manet's wife, Suzanne Leenhoff, and his favorite model, Victorine Meurent, both modelled for the nude woman, which has Meurent's face but the plumper Leenhoff's body. The man on the left is probably Manet's brother-in-law Rodolphe Leenhoff.

The style of the painting breaks with the academic traditions of the time. Manet used a harsh, "photographic" light that eliminates the mid-tones. He did not try to hide the brush strokes: indeed, the painting looks unfinished in some parts of the scenery. The nude is a far cry from the smooth, flawless ones of Cabanel or Ingres. Despite the mundane subject, Manet deliberately chose a large canvas size, normally reserved for grander subjects.

There is an element of the painting that most people overlook: in the lower left-hand corner is a small green frog, or grenouille. Other than the fact that one might expect to see a frog in a riverside setting, the frog in the painting may represent a prostitute. In 1863 grenouille was student slang for a particular type of prostitute.