Fortunately, her upper-class status provided her with the financial resources to pursue her artistic career and, after training for a while with Charles Joshua Chaplin, a society painter connected to the state-funded French Academy.
A retrospective of her work that included around 90 paintings and pastel drawings, was held in at the Salons de la Vie Moderne in Paris. Jeanne leans forward, slightly out of the box toward the viewer while looks to the side, possibly making eye contact with someone outside of the picture plane. Perhaps they're occupying themselves during an intermission or prior to the beginning of the performance.
The museum also points out that the bouquet resting on the ledge to the right of Jeanne's elbows, very closely resembles the one being presented to the reclining woman by her maid in Manet's Olympia. That seems likely but is hardly evidence that the work is in part the result of Manet's direct intervention. On the other hand, Manet taking too active a role in the work of his female followers is not without precedent.
There is an infamous episode in which Morisot was extremely upset when Manet took the liberty of modifying one of her canvases. Desraimes identifies the two figures in the loge as spouses based on what she concludes is a "reciprocal indifference of Completed five years earlier, the painting had been rejected and she had reworked it.
Nanny and Child was produced in Dieppe. The "Miss" would have tipped off viewers that the nanny was English; to have an English nanny was to be wealthy in France at the time. In this painting, the nanny takes center stage. She sits looking wistful rather than attentive to her charge, who is also absorbed in her own activity. The young woman's parasol sits discarded beside her as there is no need for it while she rests in the shade of the trees.
