Behind the Scenes with Edgar Degas

Edgar Degas is most well known for his dancers. He painted and sketched hundreds of individual dancers, dance classes, and dance performances throughout his career. However, dance is not all he painted and modeled. There is much more to Degas' repertoire than ballet. Degas portrayed laundresses, milliners, bathing women, working men, etc. While dance was often his subject, Degas exhibited in many different ways the behind the scenes actions that make up every day life. His ability to illustrate this is what set him apart from Impressionism. Though often considered an Impressionist, Degas rejected the title - and for good reason. The Impressionists painted snapshots of the world, but Degas painted and modeled snapshots of life. His subjects were people, performing whatever task they would typically be doing. Most of his works appear as though no viewer is expected to be there. Subjects avert their eyes and face away from the would be viewer. Key as well to accurately portraying these mundane moments is catching the right moment. Degas creates on canvas, pastel, and wax glimpses of actions only half complete. Instead of showing tasks that are finished, he allows the viewer to encounter the subject in the midst of what they are doing. This means, in one second, every scene would be changed entirely. While it often was ballet, Degas used a variety of subjects throughout his work as a means of inviting the viewer to come behind the scenes with him by catching very common snapshots of French life at just the right time. 

Edgar Degas, The Dance Class, 1874, oil on canvas, 1987.47.1

In this rather well known piece, Degas portrays a room of female ballet dancers at the Opera Paris. Ballet was a large part of French life and a focus of Degas' work many times. In this painting, dancers occupy almost all of the space, but hardly any of them are dancing. Some are sitting down, some seem to be still getting ready, and only one girl is actually dancing. No one in the piece is looking out to a potential viewer, because for them there is nothing beyond this dance class. While, for these dancers, practice/class is just a part of life, nearly no one every sees them in the midst of it, but Degas has put it on display. 

Edgar Degas, At the Milliner's, 1882, pastel on pale gray woven paper (industrial wrapping paper), laid down on silk bolting, 29.100.38

This pastel show two women at the milliner's. One woman is trying to choose a hat and is looking at herself in the mirror. The other is assisting the first in choosing a hat and her face is hidden by the mirror. Neither could engage with a viewer at all. In addition to this, the action of picking out a hat is an essential to French life, hidden moment. Women walk around in hats everyday so it is surely implied that they must get the hat sometime, but there are never many (if any at all) witnesses to this action. 

Edgar Degas, A Woman Ironing, 1873, oil on canvas, 29.100.46

The subject of this painting is one of contribution to a finished product. A woman faces away from the viewer as she irons. She is performing a behind the scenes action that enables public life. The finished product being made here is the clean, pressed laundry that owners will don to walk the streets of France. Her averted eyes add to the idea that, though people know the laundry gets ironed, they do not see it done.

Edgar Degas, Women Combing Her Hair, 1888-90, pastel on light green wove paper, now discolored to warm gray, affixed to original pulp-board mount, 56.231

This pastel piece is of a nude woman sitting on the floor, combing her hair. Everyone knows hair-combing takes place, but it is not always witnessed. This hair-combing is particularly private for a few reasons. First, it seems to be inside a home as there is a chair or couch in front of the women and she is sitting on a rug. Second, the woman is nude, and people do not typically parade in public without clothes on. And third, the woman has her back to the viewer. This woman has no reason to believe anyone would be watching her perform this action being performed sans clothing, in the privacy of her home. 

Edgar Degas, Portraits at the Stock Exchange, 1878-9, pastel on paper, pieced, and laid down on canvas, 1991.277.1

This pastel work is of three men. One man hands the middle a piece of paper while another man is leaned in, speaking to the middle. This is a moment taking place in public that could easily be witnessed, if not for the speed at which these things take place. In the following seconds all the men will have gone away from this spot and the information will be passed along. Interactions like this take place so often, but are too fast to be noticed. Here Degas freezes this moment in time so it can be seen. 

Edgar Degas, Woman Putting on a Stocking, 1896-1910, 1999.363.17

This bronze sculpture models a woman as she is pulling on a stocking. This is another action that would most likely take place inside a home, making it private. Though the woman's face cannot be seen, it is angled down, concentrating on what she is doing instead of interacting with a potential viewer. The fleeting nature of this moment is very clear. Any viewer can imagine pulling a sock on while standing, it does not last. People can only balance on one foot for so long and in seconds this woman would have her stocking on and her foot on the ground. Here she has been caught, forever in this moment of anticipation.