Ambroise Vollard: The Manet

The variant on Manet's "Execution of Maximilien"
referred to in the anecdote

"A famous picture of Manet's was one of the variants of the 'Execution de Maximilien.' Mme. Manet's brother considered this variant inferior because Maximilian, and the generals executed with him, did not appear to him as 'finished' as in the other painting. So the replica was taken off its stretcher, rolled up and put away in the lumber room under a cupboard.

One day it occurred to Mme. Manet's young brother that perhaps after all there was something to be done with this picture, considered unsaleable till then. The sergeant loading his rifle was cut out, framed and sold [to Degas]. What remained of the picture was rolled up again, and when I had asked Mme. Manet about any of his work that might be available, she showed it to me saying, 'What a pity Edouard took all that trouble with it. What a lot of nice things he could have painted in the time!' 

I concluded the bargain, but how was I to get the voluminous fragment to the repairer? I could not think of taking the omnibus with this sort of stovepipe in my arms. I sent for a cab. Seated inside it, with my Manet on my knees, I had to be perpetually on the lookout to preserve it from the dangers of the journey, holding it upright like a church taper when my cab threatened to get wedged between two other vehicles. In this way I got safely to Chapuis' workshop - the picture repairer who also worked for Degas.

When Chapuis had unrolled the picture, he said, 'But, M. Vollard, surely this is the picture the 'Sergeant' was taken from, that I restretched for M. Degas? He was told the rest of the picture had been destroyed by accident.' When Degas saw the repaired canvas in my shop, he recognized it at once as having belonged to the same canvas as his 'Sergeant.' There were no words found to express his indignation but, 'The Family again! Beware of the Family!' Then recovering himself, he took his stand between me and the picture, and with his hand on it by way of taking possession, he added, 'You're going to sell me that. And you'll go back to Mme. Manet and tell her I want the legs of the sergeant that are missing from my bit, as well as what's missing from yours. I'll give her something for it.'

Then by way of protest he had the 'Sergeant' and the fragment of the 'Execution de Maximilien' he had bought from me pasted onto a plain canvas, of the supposed size of the original picture, the blanks in the canvas representing the missing part. 'The Family! Beware of the Family!' he would repeat incessantly, whenever he brought his visitors to look at this restoration."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "Recollections of a Picture Dealer" by Ambroise Vollard.)