Salon des Refusés ("exhibition of rejects")

When I was researching Gustave Courbet's The Painter's Studio, I learned that the painting was rejected by the 1855 Paris World Fair's jury for the Exposition Universelle. Courbet wasn't the only painter whose works were denied for official exhibition.

The Salon des Refusés was an exhibition of works rejected by the jury of the official Paris Salon, which was sponsored by the French government and the Academy of Fine Arts. The jury was very conservative; near-photographic but idealized realism was expected. In 1851, Courbet managed to get one painting into the Salon, A Burial at Ornans, and in 1852 his The Bathers was accepted, scandalizing critics and the public, who expected romanticized nudes in classical settings.

In the famous Salon des Refusés of 1863, its jury refused 2/3 of the paintings presented, including the works of Courbet, Manet, and Pissarro. The rejected artists and their friends protested, and the protests reached Emperor Napoleon III. The Emperor's tastes in art were traditional, but he was also sensitive to public opinion. As a result, he decided to arrange a separate part of the Palace of Industry for rejected art to be displayed. The refusés included now-famous paintings such as Manet's Déjeuner sur l'herbe and James McNeill Whistler's Symphony in White, No. 1: The White Girl.