Portrait of Faure as Hamlet

Jean-Baptiste Faure was one of the great stars of the Paris Opéra, and Hamlet was his signature part, created in 1868 in Ambroise Thomas's opera. He was also one of Manet's biggest buyers, and he asked the painter for a full-length portrait in costume. Through the winter of 1876 into 1877 Faure sat close to 40 times, and by his account Manet kept changing the picture completely and starting over. The version shown at the Salon of 1877 has Faure alone against a bare grey ground, sword lowered, one arm thrown out toward something outside the frame, most likely the ghost of Hamlet's father. Critics were unkind, and Faure refused to take the painting. It was still in Manet's studio when he died, and a looser version of the same pose hangs in the Kunsthalle in Hamburg.