The Races at Longchamp
Racehorses charging towards the crowd at the Longchamp course in the Bois de Boulogne, Paris — the racecourse is still there.
Longchamp Racecourse
The painting shows a real, identified place that you can find today. The exact spot the artist worked from is not necessarily known.
The Races at Longchamp — at a glance
- Artist
- Édouard Manet (1832–1883)
- Year
- c. 1866
- Movement
- Realism / early Impressionism
- Place
- Hippodrome de Longchamp, Bois de Boulogne, Paris
- Viewpoint
- On the track near the finish, looking up the course — the racecourse is still in use
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- c. 44 × 85 cm
- Now at
- Art Institute of Chicago
Overview
The Races at Longchamp is a small, fast picture by Édouard Manet of about 1866. Unusually for racing pictures of the time, it shows the horses coming straight at the viewer down the track in a blur of legs and dust, with the crowd and carriages massed along the rails and the wooded hills of the Bois de Boulogne behind. It is oil on canvas, about 44 by 85 cm, and it hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago.
Where was The Races at Longchamp painted?
Museum interpretation The Hippodrome de Longchamp, in the Bois de Boulogne on the western edge of Paris, opened in 1857 and quickly became the fashionable Paris racecourse. Manet places the viewer on the track itself, near the finish, looking back up the course towards the grandstands and the hill of Mont-Valérien. The course is still in use for flat racing, though the stands have been rebuilt more than once.
What is in the painting?
A group of jockeys in bright silks gallops head-on down the centre of the track, the horses reduced to a smudge of motion. Along the right, a dense line of spectators, top hats, parasols and carriages presses against the white rail. On the left the open track curves away; low green hills and a pale sky close the distance. A few figures cross the course in the foreground.
Look closely
The onrushing horses
The jockeys and mounts are a smear of movement charging down the centre of the track.
The wall of spectators
Top hats, parasols and carriages jam the white rail along the right in a long diagonal.
Mont-Valérien
The wooded hill west of Paris closes the distance beyond the course.
Figures on the track
A few people cross the open foreground of the course, close to the viewer.
Analysis
Composition and light
The horses race straight down the central axis towards the viewer; the crowd forms a long diagonal wall on the right.
Scholarship Manet takes the un-picturesque head-on view rather than the usual side-on ‘flying gallop’, so the race is a rush of foreshortened movement aimed at the spectator. The rail and the crowd drive back on a hard diagonal; the paint is thin and rapid, the figures barely notated.
History & provenance
The painting is in the Art Institute of Chicago; a related version and drawings survive elsewhere.
Sources
- Art Institute of Chicago — collection entry for Édouard Manet, ‘The Races at Longchamp’ (c. 1866; oil on canvas, c. 44 × 85 cm)
- France Galop — history of the Hippodrome de Longchamp (opened 1857)
Related paintings
Current display status
Currently on viewMore by Édouard Manet
A Bar at the Folies-Bergère
The Railway
Music in the Tuileries
