Degas, actually De Gas, Edgar Hilaire, *19 July 1834 Paris, †27 September 1917 Paris, French painter, sculptor and graphic artist. One of the pioneers of modern art. Whilst the leading figures of Impressionism (Monet, Sisley, Pissarro, Renoir) were advocates of painting en plein air and sought to extract the maximum potential from colour, Degas’s passion was drawing, pencil sketches, meticulously refined in the studio. He described himself as a “colourist with line”. He was a master at recreating the atmosphere of enclosed theatrical spaces, opera foyers, and the interiors of Parisian cafés and cabarets. He sought to capture fleeting impressions and snapshot moments (as in photography). He delved deeply into the analysis of movement; he was fascinated by rhythmic gestures (often unnatural), dynamic poses, and the fleetingness of a moment captured in a unique stillness. He gathered documentation on dance technique and its strict rules from professional dancers. In his series devoted to the art of dance, he achieved particular mastery. He viewed the world of opera and ballet as if through the lens of a camera, a photographic frame that allowed for the use of asymmetrical composition, bold foreshortening, and unusual arrangements of figures, immortalised, for example, in a spontaneous gesture (The Rehearsal, 1872) or a chance moment (Dancer Putting on Her Slipper, 1875–77).
The world of theatre fascinated Edgar Degas from 1867 onward, and he remained devoted to it for the rest of his life. As he gradually lost his sight, he used charcoal or attempted to capture dancing figures in clay and wax. His first painting from the “musical” cycle depicts the orchestra of the Paris Opera. Musical instruments rhythmically structure the picture plane; the double bass, which dominates the composition, would later appear frequently in Degas’s work. The musicians portrayed in this painting — led by E. Chabrier, leaning out from a box —form a masterful example of a group portrait. Degas’s attempt to combine elements of classicism with Impressionism had a strong influence on the generation of Post-Impressionist painters, led by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
Literature: P.A. Lemoisne Degas et son oeuvre, Paris 1946–49; P. Valéry Rzeczy przemilczane. Z pism o sztuce, translated by J. Guze, Warsaw 1974; J.-P. Crespelle Degas i jego świat, translated by M. Michalska-Ciołek, Warsaw 1977; F. Kresak Edgar Degas, Warsaw 1987.
