Manet’s Oil Painting Technique. Olympia
Manet’s Oil Painting Technique Manet’s exploration of the visual and pictorial implications of a simplified tonal scheme culminated in the assurance with which he handled the nude in Olympia (1863). It is worth quoting Hamilton at some length for his assessment of the technique used in this painting and the public response to this painting. “In the Olympia the technical and conceptual experiments of the earlier years finally found a coherent and complete expression. The restricted colour range of the Bullfight, the full frontal lighting of the Dead Christ, the contemporary subject devoid of any moralizing or romantic idealization which he had sought but never achieved in the Spanish themes and which had been compromised in the Dejeuner sur l’Herbe…