EDGAR DEGAS (1834-1917)

Details

EDGAR DEGAS (1834-1917)
Danseuse vue de profil (Etude pour Danseuse posant chez un photographe)
stamped with signature lower left 'Degas' (Lugt 658)--stamped on the reverse 'ATELIER ED. DEGAS' (Lugt 657)--charcoal heightened with white chalk on green-gray paper squared for transfer
18 1/8 x 12in. (46.1 x 30.5cm.) Drawn circa 1874

Provenance

Atelier Degas, Third Sale, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, April 7-9, 1919, lot 338-2 (illustrated)
Dr. Georges Viau, Paris
Charles E. Slatkin Galleries, New York (acquired by David Daniels, May, 1960)

Literature

L. Browse, Degas Dancers, London, 1949, no. 42 (illustrated)
R. Pickvance, "Degas Dancers", Burlington Magazine, vol. CV, no. 723, June, 1963, pp. 264-265, f.n. 74 (illustrated, p. 261, fig. 19)
ed. M. Pantazzi, Degas, New York, 1988, p. 244 (Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition catalogue; illustrated, fig. 123)

Exhibited

Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, Exposition Degas, 1924, no. 112
New York, Charles E. Slatkin Galleries, French Master Drawings, XVI-XX Centuries, Feb.-March, 1959, no. 97
New York, Charles E. Slatkin Galleries, Renoir, Degas, Sculptures and Drawings, Oct.-Nov., 1960, no number (illustrated, pl. II)
Minneapolis, Institute of Arts, Drawings, Paintings & Sculpture from Three Private Collections, July-Aug., 1960, no. 11 (illustrated)
Newark, The Museum, Nineteenth Century Master Drawings, March-April, 1961, no. 42 (illustrated)
Ann Arbor, University of Michigan, Museum of Art, A Generation of Draughtsmen, April-May, 1962, no. 53 (illustrated, pl. Vb)
Minneapolis, Institute of Arts, Selections from the Drawings Collection of David Daniels, Feb.-April, 1968, no. 51 (illustrated). The exhibition traveled to Chicago, The Art Institute, May-June, 1968; Kansas City, Missouri, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery-Mary Atkins Museum, July-Sept., 1968; Cambridge, Harvard University, Fogg Art Museum, Oct.-Nov., 1968, and Waterville, Maine, Colby College, Art Museum, Jan.-Feb., 1969.

Lot Essay

This drawing is a study for Danseuse posant chez un photographe (Lemoisne, vol. II, no. 447; coll. Pushkin Fine Art Museum, Moscow). Lillian Browse (op. cit., p. 352) remarks on how closely Degas adhered to this preparatory drawing as he completed the painting. Whereas it has traditionally been dated 1876, or 1878-1879, Ronald Pickvance (op. cit.) has demonstrated that the painting was exhibited in London in May, 1875, and placing it in the series of Dance Class paintings, believes it was done in 1874.

The edge of a tall mirror is visible in the painting at the right-hand side; the dancer examines herself in it as she poses. In the London exhibition the painting was entitled Dancer in Front of a Looking-glass. Degas changed the title to include mention of the photographer's studio when the painting was included in the Fourth Impressionist Exhibition in 1879. The change in the title may have been an afterthought; it nonetheless indicates that Degas had taken an interest in photography much earlier than was previously thought. Indeed, the distortion of perspective evident as the dancer places her left foot in the pointe en quatrième devant, a pose Degas often depicted, may derive from the way a camera lens distorts an image when it is too close to its subject. The painting and this study for it are one of a series of works Degas executed contre-jour, in front of a window, in which he analyzes the subtle, radiant effects of light striking the model from behind.