The Races at Longchamp

Edouard Manet took a real gamble when he painted the horses at Longchamp in 1864. Rather than showing them thundering past from the side, as nearly every other artist would have done, he planted us smack in the middle of the track. The horses come barreling straight at us, their legs dissolving into blurs of brown and shadow. That sense of raw speed feels surprisingly ahead of its time, and it turns a simple day at the races into something thrilling and a little dizzying.

Longchamp had only recently opened when Manet set up his scene, and the track quickly became the place where fashionable Parisians came to mingle and show off. The crowd gathers along the left side, sketched with rapid dabs of paint rather than tidy faces. Manet cared more about catching the buzz of the moment than recording every detail, and that loose approach helped pave the way for the Impressionists who came soon after. Gentle green hills and a grey, cloudy sky stretch across the top, giving the frantic charge below a quiet backdrop to push against.