Frontispiece for an edition of Les Ballades” by Théodore de Banville”

Description

Manet’s frontispiece for Les Ballades shows a half-length man in a cap facing left, with small figures arranged above and behind him. Manet gives the frontispiece for Banville’s Les Ballades an imaginative setting, joining a larger human presence with a different scale of activity overhead. The image offers a visual opening whose character can be encountered independently of the literary work it accompanies.

The design dates to 1874, while this etching and aquatint on blue laid paper belongs to the Strölin edition of 1905. The frontispiece’s book function is distinct from its present material form, preserving a design through a later printed impression. Manet brings the figure and surrounding fantasy into a graphic field where differing scales can coexist. The work joins literary association with an image that has its own visual life, allowing the contrast between the principal figure and the small forms above to sustain attention.

Read our guide to giclée prints, browse more Édouard Manet prints, or explore Portrait of Charles Baudelaire in Profile.