玻璃瓶中的玫瑰

This is close to the last thing Manet painted. By the winter of 1882 he could barely walk. The disease attacking his nervous system had made a full-size canvas impossible, so he worked small, and friends and visitors kept bringing him flowers. He set the bouquets in a plain glass vase on a table and painted them quickly, fresh while they lasted, a few roses with the water and glass caught in a handful of sure strokes. He was 51. In April 1883 his left leg, gone gangrenous, was amputated, and he died days later. He made a dozen or so of these small flower pieces in those final months, working from whatever came through the door.