It’s been a great summer and fall here at the gallery!

We’ve had a steady stream of Bodega Bay visitors from near and far — lots from the Central Valley and Sacramento, plus folks from just about every corner of the U.S. and beyond. We’ve welcomed travelers from the U.K., Scandinavia, Europe, Central and South America, Africa, Asia, and even Australia. Since reopening our gallery, it’s been a joy to reconnect with such a wide mix of interesting people who make their way to Bodega Bay.

Linda’s Art Trails Open Studio was a big success this year! She loved being part of the Sonoma County artist community and meeting so many old friends and new faces during the event.

Taking over the whole front room was an opportunity to highlight Linda's bold style. Even though many of her paintings will not be on view in the showroom, most of the paintings will be nearby and not difficult to bring out for returning visitors and those who see something on her website that interests them. lindasorensenpaintings.com Linda continues to paint new works, now in an alcove of the front room.

One of the greatest joys of running an art gallery is sharing original paintings and the stories behind them. Every piece has a journey, and we love being part of that story.

Of course, there is one small downside to the gallery business: we can only sell each painting once. But this month, we have a delightful exception!

We’re thrilled to welcome back Joshua Meador’s Rainy Windy Day — a small painting we first framed and sold 18 years ago. It has now come home, ready to charm visitors all over again. Until it finds its next collector, you can see it here in the gallery, waiting to begin its next chapter.

Paris was absolutely electrifying during the Belle Époque. From the 1870s up until the start of World War I, it was undergoing a huge transformation. The city was being redesigned, new technologies were reshaping how people lived, worked, and moved around — and amid all this change, the growing middle class was discovering leisure time and embracing life in a new way.

In the middle of it all were artists. They were flourishing and saw possibility everywhere. Painters captured the city's life, the wide boulevards, open-air cafés, fresh fashions, and joyful people embracing modern life. Their art reflected the light, energy and optimism of the age.

The art world was experiencing change, keeping pace with all the newness around them. A group of painters, later dubbed the Impressionists, started pulling away from the traditional studio setup. They wanted to paint what they actually saw in the moment, often outside, in natural light. They experimented with looser brushwork, vibrant colors, thick dabs of paint, all to capture the sparkle and immediacy of life. Even though the traditional establishment often rejected them, their work couldn’t be silenced. It felt fresh, daring, and absolutely in tune with the times — a new kind of art for a new kind of era.

Within this lively world of new ideas and artistic friendships, two painters have a story worth telling: Édouard Manet and Berthe Morisot. Manet was slightly older and never officially part of the Impressionist group, but his bold style and modern subjects helped spark the movement.

In 1868, fellow artist Henri Fantin‑Latour, introduced 36-year-old Manet to the 27-year-old Morisot. They were both visiting the Louvre where they were studying and copying the old masters. Manet was an established Parisian artist and Morisot was already an accomplished artist painting from her family’s studio.

The pair hit it off. Soon after their meeting, Manet asked Morisot to pose for him, leading to The Balcony—the first of eleven works in which she appeared.

Morisot admired Manet’s fearless approach, but she already had developed her own artistic voice, shaped by painting outdoors under the influence of Camille Corot. Still, Manet inspired her to explore more modern subjects and loosen her technique.

In return, Morisot’s approach encouraged Manet to paint outside and bring a fresher, lighter touch to his own work. Their collaboration was a true creative exchange—one that helped define the look of modern painting.

Young Woman at Her Window was painted by Morisot soon after The Balcony was on view at the Salon. Morisot’s sister Edma, also an accomplished artist, models for this scene. Edma gave up painting after her marriage but remained supportive of Berthe’s artistic endeavours, posing for many of her paintings. When Manet saw this painting, he hailed it a “masterpiece,” and encouraged Berthe to show it at the Salon of 1870. It was accepted but was hung high on a wall, receiving little notice.

Berthe Morisot with a Bouquet of Violets shows Morisot dressed in a black mourning dress holding a bouquet of violets barely visible. A suggestion of the top of the bouquet can be seen against her lighter-coloured blouse. Unlike many of Manet’s other portraits, Morisot is illuminated from her right side, leaving half her face in shadow. Her eyes are not their natural green, but instead are dark—matching her mourning garb. Morisot acquired this portrait in 1894, a year before her untimely death due to pneumonia at the age of 54.

The Harbour at Lorient shows Morisot’s sister Edma perched on a sea-wall in a white summer dress with a parasol. Edma had recently married a naval officer, now stationed at Lorient. Upon her return to Paris, Berthe presented this painting as a gift to Manet.

On the Beach at Boulogne‑sur‑Mer and On the Beach at Petites‑Dalles (or Fécamp) compare Manet's studio-work with Morisot's plein-air study. Both were painted on the Normandy Coast. Manet built his scene up from sketchbook drawings and reworked his surface heavily, while Morisot executed her painting quickly, capturing salted air and sunlight filtered through clouds.

In a Villa by the Sea was painted a year after Morisot saw The Railway in progress in Monet’s studio and on view at the Salon of 1874. Morisot painted her sister Edma and her niece in a similar pose to the figures Manet used in The Railway.

Reading was shown at the first Impressionist Exhibition. It shows a Parisian lady absorbed in a book while seated in the grass, her parasol and fan discarded beside her. The model is Morisot’s sister, Edma. Unlike Manet, whose figures often return the viewer’s gaze, Morisot’s figures are most often absorbed in tasks or private reflection.

Lilacs at Maurecourt was painted soon after the First Impressionist Exhibition where she had shown Reading. Here she paints her sister Edma seated on the grass doing needlework with her young daughters beneath a lilac tree. After viewing this painting, Manet was inspired to paint a similar scene at the end of the summer.

Interior shows a woman lost in her thoughts. The empty chair and the child at the window are clues of an anticipated visitor. At the right is an intricate still life of a large planter. Against the planter appears to be an unframed canvas—a painting within a painting. This suggests that the anticipated visitor may be a client.

Eugène Manet on the Isle of Wight was painted during Eugène and Berthe’s honeymoon on the Isle of Wight, just off the southern coast of England, south of Southampton. Eugène is the only man to appear in any of Berthe’s paintings. In a letter to her sister, Berthe compared Eugène’s ability as a model: “Poor Eugène, who takes your place but is a less obliging model.”

Boating is a painting Manet worked on (on and off) for years. Begun on the riverside in Argenteuil in 1874, Manet paints a couple in a sailboat on a bright, horizonless stretch of water. The figures are painted differently: the man is a solid form while the woman is painted with swift brush-strokes. Her depiction appears less substantial. Manet’s fluttering brush-work of the woman’s striped dress and veil appears to demonstrate his attempt to keep pace with Morisot and others in the Impressionist group.

Lake in the Bois de Boulogne has similar compositional elements to Boating. But Morisot’s painting is glimmering, full of wet zig-zags of paint. This painting was shown at the fifth Impressionist Exhibition in 1880.

Before the Mirror is Manet’s most “Morisotian” painting. The model is half-dressed, standing in front of a mirror; her bare upper back and blue corset are prominent in the foreground as the woman gazes at her reflection. Brisk strokes of white conjure the pleats and laces of her garments, with similar strokes repeated throughout the wallpaper and drapery background.

Woman at her Toilette … Here, the model sits with her back to the viewer as she pins or unpins her hair. The mirror does not show the woman’s image. Hints of a bedstead suggest that the setting is Morisot’s own bedroom. A bedside table offers up a small still life of glassware, a powder puff and a flower. Curiously, a week after this painting made its debut at the fifth Impressionist Exhibition, Manet showed his similar painting Before the Mirror at his own solo exhibition nearby.

Dahlias shows a bouquet in a white vase dropping its petals on a table. On the other side of the vase is a folded fan. Manet also painted a vase with dahlias, but that painting has disappeared. Both Manet and Morisot were accomplished still-life painters, but both seemed ambivalent about the genre. Perhaps still life had said all it had to say, leaving the artists to imitate what had already been done and therefore feel less challenged.

Soup Tureen and Apple is well done, offering glistening reflected light within a gracious setting. Good as it is though, this is a rare still life by Morisot. Painting still lifes of kitchen items did not thrill her. She had shown a still life at the Salon of 1865 (the painting is now lost) which received a negative, patronising review: “Since one needn’t have drawn for long at the Academy to paint the corner of a table with a cooking pot … women do reasonably well with such housekeeping pictures.”

At the Milliner’s leaves us wondering. It appears Manet began this painting with the intention of showing a shop-girl or customer in a Parisian hat shop, but gradually he changed his intent—lowering the neckline of the model’s dress, and shifting the scene to seem more like a private domestic setting. Is she a milliner in a shop, or a courtesan in a boudoir? Perhaps a combination of the two?

Young Woman Dressed for a Ball was shown at the fifth Impressionist Exhibition of 1880. Manet created paintings with similar subjects, but his pictures reflected the pleasure he took from being an observer of fashionable women, whereas Morisot’s painting shows her understanding of what it is like being the one observed. In 1893, the painting was purchased by the French state and entered the national collection.

Woman Sewing shows a woman of Morisot’s own social set intent on doing needlework, considered a genteel pastime. Dressed with elegant sobriety, she wears discreet jewelry with no visible makeup, apparently feeling completely at home in her bourgeois setting.

Summer (Woman Beside a Window) shows a young woman seated holding a summery bonnet and parasol, seated by an open window. She appears to be on a social call. Here the dress and the background are both rendered with open brushwork, giving a shimmering vibrancy to the portrait.

Jeanne (Spring) is a portrait of the aspiring actress Jeanne Demarsy, a chic Parisienne in the springtime of her life. This painting received rapturous reviews at the Salon of 1882. One critic described Manet’s subject as “not a woman but a bouquet, truly a perfume for the eyes.”

Méry (Autumn):Because of his success with Jeanne (Spring) at the Salon of 1882, Manet began work on a sequel on a canvas of equal dimensions. This time his model was Méry Laurent, a retired actress and one of Manet’s closest friends. Méry poses in front of a background of Japanese silk, wearing a dark dress, a fur muff and sapphire earrings. The painting was in his studio when he died, and was finished by another artist. Some Morisot-styled brushstrokes Manet was using towards the end of his career may have been changed at that time.

Winter (Woman with a Muff) shows a woman dressed in cold-weather attire. The background evokes snow in a low-light, overcast day. Morisot shows this woman in the Bois de Boulogne, a large park on the west side of Paris. The model’s costume and her pose are similar to Manet’s Berthe Morisot with a Bouquet of Violets done nearly a decade earlier.

Woman in a Round Hat shows a woman dressed in a stylish ensemble, casting a sidelong glance from under her dotted veil. Manet’s erotic interest in this subject is to a slight degree subtly implied. Morisot, on the other hand, painted modern women—be they household employees, debutantes or matrons—based on her contacts or experience.

Young Woman Knitting (Pasie in the Garden): During the summer of 1881, Eugène and Berthe rented a summer-house northwest of Paris in Bougival, where Morisot painted their family maid and nanny Pasie as she posed on a garden bench working on her knitting in front of a white rose bush. The following winter and spring, Berthe nursed her daughter Julie in the warmer environs of the South of France. Eugène had returned to Paris to sort through Berthe’s canvases in preparation for the sixth Impressionist Exhibition. Eugène wrote her with a question: “I found Pasie sewing on a bench, quite good. Should we show it?”

Eugène and Julie Manet in the Garden at Bougival… Eugène was an attentive husband and father, defying late-19th-century gender stereotypes. He patiently balances a toy-model on his knees to Julie’s delight. Bright paint shows Morisot’s flair for color as the family’s garden behind Eugène and Julie is in riotous bloom. When Eugène found this canvas rolled up when he returned to Paris the following winter, he entered it into the sixth Impressionist Exhibition.

At Bougival (Woman and Child in a Meadow at Bougival)… In 1882, Morisot was on the French Riviera in Nice. Manet wrote to her encouraging her to participate in the planned Impressionist Exhibition: “Send what you’ve made down there and a little picture you showed me at Bougival, Bibi and Pasie.” “Bibi” was Berthe’s daughter Julie’s nickname and Pasie was her nanny. In the scene, they were picking wildflowers surrounded by tall grass in glistening sun.

Little Girl with Blonde Hair… The sitter is Morisot’s niece, Jeannie Gobillard (age six or seven at the time). This portrait is double-sided; the verso side contains a copy of Morisot’s Berthe Morisot with a Fan by Manet.

The Lesson in the Garden shows a pleasing sunlit scene of Eugène and Julie drawing while seated in their garden. Both Eugène and Julie filled sketch-books, often while modelling for Berthe. Although Eugène’s talent was never near that of Édouard or Berthe, he enjoyed being artistic and imparting that love of art to their daughter.

Julie Manet with a Watering Can… Even though Julie Manet was only four years old when her uncle Édouard died, she had memories of him. She later wrote, “I remember a few things, a visit to Rueil the last year of his life. He was already sick, but quite jolly. That day, he made my portrait sitting on a watering can. I think Mama was sorry he didn’t continue it.”

Self-Portrait (Berthe Morisot)… Here, Berthe peers out from the canvas as if she is looking into her image in a mirror. The style is freely brushed and confident. She appears vigorous in mid-life; her hair dusted with bits of grey, her expression resolute and her palette-hand active, appearing as a blur. The flowers on her dress appear like military decorations.

In the summer of 1882, Eugène and Berthe Morisot returned to their summer-house, often visiting Édouard Manet who rented a house five miles distant in the town of Rueil. Both Berthe and Édouard painted pictures of Julie, then just three and a half years old. In Berthe’s painting, Playing in the Sand, she shows Julie crouched on a garden path mixing sand and water with total concentration.

Before the Mirror (Berthe Morisot) may contain subtle clues of the story of her artistic and personal relationship with Manet. The scene is of a young woman enjoying a private moment while sitting at her dressing-table. Her pose is graceful with emphatic contours and daring nudity. Reflected in the mirror on the opposite wall is Édouard Manet’s portrait of Berthe. Is this Berthe’s intimate way of showing an homage to her great friend and collaborator Édouard Manet?
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Manet and Morisot runs through March 1, 2026, at the Legion of Honor.

The Legion of Honor's Manet and Morisot exhibition's page | Back to the Top