The Railway was the last painting featuring Victorine Meurent, who was a favorite model of Edouard Manet. You will see Victorine in the previous works of Edouard Manet – Olympia and The Luncheon on the Grass. Gare Saint-Lazare, one of the busiest train stations in Paris, is the location where Manet’s two models are present.

Meurent is sitting in the front of an iron fence, looking towards the audience. She is wearing a blue dress and a dark hat, keeping a book and a puppy on her lap. Next to Meurent, you can see a little girl, who is the daughter of Alphonse Hirsch, a neighbor of Manet. The little girl is watching the train passing by and having subtle interaction with Meurent The iron gratings were stretched across the canvas by Manet and the presence of the train was covered by white clouds of steam.

In the background, Modern apartment buildings were painted including the house on the Rue de Saint Petersbourg where Manet had rented a studio. The place was near the Place de l’Europe and Manet owned the studio since 1872 including a signal box and the Pont de l’Europe.

The dimensions of the painting The Railway are 93.3 cm × 111.5 cm or 36.9 in × 45.12 in.

The Railway painting indicates that it was made in the autumn season. On the right side of the painting, bunch of grapes are resting on a parapet which indicate this information. Manet in his earlier painting (Olympia) had used compositions of Titian’s earlier work, for instance, the dog seen in this painting is regarded as a reference to Titian’s Venus of Urbino

The work can be viewed at National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.  

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This was one of the paintings, known for David’s success as a painter. Napoleon didn’t pose for this portrait despite this the details of the picture are astonishing.

Napoleon is the main focus of the picture in vertical canvas dressed in his uniform as a colonel of the Foot Grenadiers of the Imperial Guard (color was blue which contains white facings along with red cuffs). He also wears his Legion d’honneur and Order of the Iron Crown decorations. Napoleon face is turned towards the viewer and his right hand inserted into his vest. The office of Napoleon was on the first floor, the right hand of the Tuileries which contains a wooden chair decorated in red velvet and gold embroidery and a desk of empire style decorated on it with a lion’s head. There are several things on the desk including a pen, several books, dossiers and papers rolled up. A map is shown on the green carpet with more rolled papers to the left of the desk in this picture. The papers contains painter’s signature LVDci DAVID OPVS 1812.

The painting shows many details including Napoleon’s unbuttoned cuffs, wrinkled stockings, disheveled hair and time on the clock to be exact 4.13 am. All of this implies that he has been up all night writing code Napoléon as on the desk the word “Code” is prominent on the rolled papers. This portrait maintains Napoleon’s new civil image rather than heroic or military though the sword still refers back to his military successes which were on the chair’s armrest.

The second version of this painting was painted by Louis, both were identical but the difference is that Napoleon was in more green mounted chasseurs uniform. This version was in Prince Napoleon’s collection since 1979 been in that of the Château de Versailles. David, the artist re-edited several composition, details several times which an analysis of the original painting reveals, to balance the image, add allusions, and capture a complete story.

The work can be viewed at National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

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