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Edgar
Degas Biography
Edgar Degas, (1834 -1917),
reflects a concern for the psychology of movement and expression and
the harmony of line and continuity of contour. These characteristics
set Degas apart from the other impressionist painters, although he
took part in all but one of the 8 impressionist exhibitions between
1874 and 1886. Degas was the son of a wealthy banker, and his aristocratic
family background instilled into his early art a haughty yet sensitive
quality of detachment. As he grew up, his idol was the painter Jean
Auguste Ingres, whose example pointed him in the direction of a classical
draftsmanship, stressing balance and clarity of outline. After beginning
his artistic studies with Louis Lamothes, a pupil of Ingres, he started
classes at the Ecole des Beaux Arts but left in 1854 and went to Italy.
He stayed there for 5 years, studying Italian art, especially Renaissance
works. Returning to Paris in 1859, he painted portraits of his family
and friends and a number of historical subjects, in which he combined
classical and romantic styles. In Paris, Degas came to know Édouard
Manet, and in the late 1860s he turned to contemporary themes, painting
both theatrical scenes and portraits with a strong emphasis on the
social and intellectual implications of props and settings. In the
early 1870s the female ballet dancer became his favorite theme. He
sketched from a live model in his studio and combined poses into groupings
that depicted rehearsal and performance scenes in which dancers on
stage, entering the stage, and resting or waiting to perform are shown
simultaneously and in counterpoint, often from an oblique angle of
vision. On a visit in 1872 to Louisiana, where he had relatives in
the cotton business, he painted The Cotton Exchange at New Orleans
(finished 1873; Musée Municipal, Pau, France), his only picture to
be acquired by a museum in his lifetime. Other subjects from this
period include the racetrack, the beach, and cafe interiors. After
1880, Pastel became Degas's preferred medium. He used sharper colors
and gave greater attention to surface patterning, depicting milliners,
laundresses, and groups of dancers against backgrounds now only sketchily
indicated. For the poses, he depended more and more on memory or earlier
drawings. Although he became guarded and withdrawn late in life, Degas
retained strong friendships with literary people. In 1881 he exhibited
a sculpture, Little Dancer (a bronze casting of which is in the Museum
of Fine Arts, Boston), and as his eyesight failed thereafter he turned
increasingly to sculpture, modeling figures and horses in wax over
metal armatures. These sculptures remained in his studio in disrepair
and were cast in bronze only after his death
To buy
Edgar Degas prints framed click the Framed
Link or Mounted Link.
Edgar Degas Painting Gallery
