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After the scandal of Olympia at the 1865 Salon, the following year had his Fifer rejected. he showed it to the public in 1867 in the private exhibition that he organized alongside the Exposition Universelle. The Fifer was dismissed as naive and derisively compared to a playing card by people who failed to appreciate the references to Velázquez, whose work Manet had recently been admiring in the Museo del Prado in Madrid. Only the young journalist Émile Zola defended the painting which he had seen in the artist's studio.
In this painting Manet contrived a bold synthesis of Spanish painting and Japanese prints. The unprecedented conception of space that resulted had a profound impact on Degas, Toulouse-Lautrec, and Gauguin.
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