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Sketches of a Café Singer

Creator

French Photographer · 1834–1917

Artist

> No art was ever less spontaneous than mine. What I do is the result of reflection and study of the great masters; of inspiration, spontaneity, temperament . . . I know nothing. > > --Edgar Germaine Hilaire Degas From a wealthy Parisian family, Degas devoted himself exclusively to painting without needing to sell a canvas. His training was conventional: he spent five years in Italy, studied the O

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Date: about 1877
Medium: Drawing
Culture: French
Department: Drawings
Institution: Getty Museum

During the year that he took to fill this sketchbook, Edgar Degas became fascinated with the singers who gave concerts in the cafés that he visited, filling numerous pages with images of them. Here he experimented by showing the robust curves of different café singers from various angles. On the left one singer gestures emotionally. Hastily drawn parallel lines suggest the folds of her dress as it puddles on the floor around her feet and bunches at her hips. The singer on the right opens her mouth in full song. A smudge across her face casts it into shadow and makes the rest of her body appear in brilliant relief.

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