Hans Ostrom’s “A Bar at the Folies-Bergere” reads like a voice inside Manet’s painting, speaking to a customer at the counter. The mirror offers a flat, brilliant scene: bottles, crystal, jewels, and pale flesh in black, arranged as a glittering barricade against the dawn. The barmaid waits, detached, until you show pleasure. When your gaze moves to the mirror behind her, her back looks earnest and endearing; the reflected crowd seems busy, cramped, and small. You prefer the solitary woman, yet you take your drink and join the tables anyway. Then the final turn: you sense someone gazing at you, too. The mood is cool, self-conscious, and quietly lonely—a scene of looking and being looked at, where solitude feels both chosen and haunted.
A Bar at the Folies-Bergere — Summary
If you're interested, the mirror will show a flat, brilliant image of our lustrous clutter, of much white flesh draped in black, of green bottles, brown bottles, other mirrors, crystal, lanterns, jewels— glass and gems we’ve arranged as a barricade against dawn.
The woman behind the bar lets her gaze wander until you express your pleasure. She wears black velvet trimmed in lace, a brooch depended on a black ribbon, a golden bracelet on her arm.
After you order, your gaze wanders to the mirror behind her. There her back looks earnest and endearing. There’s our society, too—busy, cramped, posing, political, small. Your gaze prefers the solitary woman.
Nonetheless you take it and your drink, and you join the tables, and sense someone gazing at you, too.