Manet became a student in the studio of
Thomas Couture from 1850. However, he grew to dislike his master's
Salon style and in 1856 set up his own studio. Little of Manet's earliest work survives and much may have been destroyed by Manet himself.
The Absinthe Drinker is a full-length portrait of an alcoholic
chiffonnier (
rag-picker) named Collardet who frequented that area around the
Louvre in Paris. Collardet is painted in mostly brown, grey and black tones. He is standing, wears a black
top hat and is wrapped in a brown
cloak, like an aristocrat; he leans on a ledge with the empty bottle discarded on the ground by his feet. Manet later added a half-full glass of
absinthe on the ledge. Part of the reason for its rejection may be its subject; absinthe was thought to be addictive and considered morally degenerate, and this was one of the earliest depictions of absinthe in art. According to art historian Charles F. Stuckey, the painting presented in 1859 may have been significantly different and inferior to the current version, with the subject's legs and the absinthe glass not depicted. Refusal of other works by young painters led eventually to the creation of the
Salon des Refusés in 1863. Manet continued to revise the work after 1859 and inserted the same cloaked figure into his 1862 painting
The Old Musician. The original full-length portrait was cut down to three-quarter length by 1867 when it was exhibited by Manet with 56 other works in a self-funded retrospective at the
Exposition Universelle held in Paris. In 1872, Manet sold
The Absinthe Drinker and 22 other paintings to the art dealer
Paul Durand-Ruel "for 35,000 francs, at the prices he [Manet] was asking". The glass of absinthe was a late addition, between 1867 and 1872. The painting was sold to opera singer
Jean-Baptiste Faure in 1906 and exhibited at the
Statens Museum for Kunst in Copenhagen in 1914 when it was acquired for the Ny Carlsberg Foundation. It was one of the first modern works added to the collection at the
Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, where it is still held. == Inspirations ==