Salon of 1846

Known for his equal skill in poetry and prose, Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867) was one of the most distinctive writers of the nineteenth century. Operating within the French literary scene, his provocative theories on contemporary art remain relevant today. His poetry collections include Les Fleurs du mal (1857) and Petits poèmes en prose (1868). Notable criticisms can be found in Baudelaire: Selected Writings on Art and Artists (1995). Michael Fried is a poet, art critic, art historian, and literary scholar. His many books include Absorption and Theatricality: Painting and Beholder in the Age of Diderot (1980), Art and Objecthood: Essays and Reviews (1998), and The Moment of Caravaggio (2010). Previous books of poems are Powers (1973), To the Center of the Earth (1994), and The Next Bend in the Road (2004). Fried is Professor Emeritus of the Humanities at Johns Hopkins University.

• Introduction; To The Bourgeois; I. What is the Good of Criticism?; II. What is Romanticism?; III. On Colour; IV. Eugene Delacroix; V. On Erotic Subjects in Art, and on M. Tassaert; VI. On Some Colourists; VII. On the Ideal and the Model; VIII. Some Draughstmen; IX. On Portaiture; X. The 'Chic' and the 'Poncif'; XI. M. Horace Vernet; XII. On Eclecticism and Doubt; XIII. On M. Ary Scheffer and the Apes of Sentiment; XIV. On Some Doubters; XV. On Landscape; XVI. Why Sculpture is Tiresome; XVII. On Schools and Journeymen; XVIII. On the Heroism of Modern Life

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