Degas, Edgar

Edgar Degas (1834-1917) stands as one of the most innovative artists of the nineteenth century, whose distinctive vision transformed how modern life could be depicted on canvas. Born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas in Paris to a wealthy banking family—his father French, his mother a Louisiana Creole from New Orleans—Degas received a classical education before abandoning law studies in 1855 to pursue art. Never marrying and maintaining a reclusive lifestyle, he devoted himself entirely to his craft, becoming both a brilliant conversationalist in artistic circles and a fiercely independent painter. Degas's artistic significance lies in his role as a founder of Impressionism, despite his ambivalent relationship with the movement. Unlike his contemporaries, he rejected plein air painting and the Impressionist label itself, preferring to be called a Realist, yet he exhibited with the Impressionists from their earliest shows in 1874 through 1886. His approach synthesized academic training with radical modernity: mentored by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, who famously advised him to "draw lines, young man, and still more lines," Degas brought classical draftsmanship to contemporary subjects. He captured the energy of Parisian cultural life—ballet dancers, racehorses, laundresses, women bathing—with an intimacy and psychological depth that distinguished him from purely observational Impressionists. His career evolved from early history paintings toward depicting modern Paris in the late 1860s. More than half his oeuvre features ballet dancers, exploring rehearsal rooms and backstage moments rather than public performances. As his eyesight deteriorated from the 1880s onward, he increasingly focused on pastels and sculpture, creating luminous works in pastel and intimate bronze figures of dancers and horses. He ceased creating art entirely after 1912 due to near-blindness. Degas's technical innovations revolutionized compositional possibilities. Influenced by photography and Japanese prints, he employed asymmetrical arrangements, radical cropping, and unusual perspectives that anticipated twentieth-century art. He experimented relentlessly across media—oil, pastel, monotype, mixed media, photography—often combining techniques in single works. His mastery of pastel particularly distinguished his late career, achieving effects of extraordinary luminosity and movement through unprecedented layering techniques and experimental use of fixatives. Degas's legacy profoundly shaped modern art. He directly influenced Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Mary Cassatt, and Walter Sickert, while his compositional strategies and psychological realism anticipated developments in twentieth-century painting and photography. Today, his work fills major collections worldwide, testament to an artist who captured modernity's fleeting moments with timeless precision and humanity.