Background. First or last?

I’m Well it would of course be lead white, titanium will do the job but not in the same league… but we have no choice, although you can still get it but not easy. Robert is the expert on this stuff, I’ve used it at college some decades ago, and obtained a large tube more recently, albeit it’s all gone now… I think the blue would also have been applied later… love the blue he’s used! Almost certainly he’d work on the dark background or a dark toned support as his first step, but it is certainly intense, but not an issue I don’t think. I’m sure Robert can off more insight…

There are other whites of course - Zinc is problematic in use, but not so much in upper layers as in lower ones; lithopone might be a choice - the generally accepted weakness of Titanium is that it's very cold, bold, and opaque; a lot of people warm it with tiny quantities of yellow ochre, or even cadmium red - very tiny amounts of the latter, or you'll get pink.  I'm presuming Manet would have used lead white - there was an experimental form of Titanium white available in around 1890, but Manet (I just looked) died in 1880 something; he might have enhanced his lead white with zinc...  As to whether he painted his whites over the darks, I doubt  it - though ageing though I be, I wasn't there at the time...  I would imagine he stained the canvas to his satisfaction, and painted  his whites and darks over that, reasserting edges of the flowers where necessary.  The blue - and yes, it's a lovely one, I wonder what he used - may have derived from the glass itself being tinted with blue rather than a reflection of something else - the blue-tinted shadow next to the glass suggests that. Whites in general - you can now get Titanium, Zinc, Lithopone, Flake White Non-Toxic, Warm White, Lowry White, Permalba White, and if you can find a source, Flake, Cremnitz, Flemish, and basic lead whites ....  you have to jump through a few hoops to get these last four lead chromate whites, but it can be done still.  Lead white is, incidentally, still available in most of the USA: one of the things they got right, because they have a powerful artists' lobby which argued (as we should have done in Europe) that lead  white was the best for long-term strength (and warmth) and the basis of all European painting right up to the 20th century, when good intentions of legislators overtook good judgement. 

An interesting read.  I look forward to seeing your copy Norrette. Manet is a favourite artist of mine.  He painted many flowers, quite a few before his death apparently…don’t know if this was one of them.  He knew he was dying.  His friends brought many bouquets, which he painted often while in bed with an easel next it.  He couldn’t walk far and was very ill.  The urge to paint still strong in him.