Berthe Morisot with a Bouquet of Violets

Manet made this in 1872, and it is almost entirely black. The sitter is Berthe Morisot, a painter herself and soon part of the first Impressionist shows, who modeled for Manet many times in these years. Here she wears black mourning dress and a black hat, ribbons and scarves crowding her pale face, and Manet does something he rarely did, lighting her hard from one side so half the face falls into shadow. People at the time treated black as the absence of colour. He treats it as a dozen different colours, warm and cool, that only read as one from across the room. The violets that give the picture its name are almost lost, a small dab of purple at the neckline you have to hunt for.