Portrait of Stéphane Mallarmé

Portrait of Stéphane Mallarmé is an 1876 oil on canvas painting by the French artist Edouard Manet, held in the Musee d'Orsay in Paris. It shows the poet Stéphane Mallarmé leaning back against a white cushioned couch, holding a cigar and appearing lost in thought, his arm resting on a bundle of papers, against wallpaper decorated with Japanese-influenced floral motifs. Manet and Mallarmé were close friends from 1873 until Manet's death in 1883, meeting almost daily, and the portrait was regarded by contemporaries as the best likeness of the poet among the many painted and engraved portraits made of him.