Sketches of Café Singers

Getty Museum

Sketches of Café Singers

Creator

Edgar Degas

French Photographer · 1834–1917

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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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Object Description · Getty Museum

Focusing on the performer's expression and gestures from several angles, Edgar Degas quickly captured several café singers absorbed in their songs. At the left, one faces to the left, with just the triangular tip of her nose visible from behind. At the bottom, one stands with joined hands. Two black lines form her closed eyes, a curved line her nose, and another makes her mouth. Another singer behind opens her mouth in full song as she gestures with one extended hand. Two other lightly sketched figures on the right face right. At the upper left, a carefully shaded sketch of a woman's head with downcast eyes is probably by another hand. Degas often passed around his sketchbook to allow others to contribute to it. In Degas's youth, his teacher Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres instructed him to "use lines, young man, many lines, both to remember as well as to copy nature." Quick sketches such as these two were vital tools for the artist to record a specific performance he attended or person he had observed as he prepared for a more elaborate painting or print.

Getty Museum’s catalogue record

produced_by.carried_out_by[0].id
https://data.getty.edu/museum/collection/person/8b37c957-95e3-4a45-b819-50e0bcc226d8
Artist/Maker
Edgar Degas
subject_of[Homepage].id
https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/108E23
Date
1877
Culture
French
Object Type
Drawing

Taken from LinkedCulture’s stored copy of Getty Museum’s record. A fresh capture of the museum’s own record has not been made for this object yet.

From LinkedCulture

One page from Edgar Degas's sketchbook holds six café singers captured in a single evening in 1877. At the bottom center, a standing figure with joined hands and closed eyes is rendered in just a few spare lines, while behind her another singer throws open her mouth mid-song, one arm extended in full gesture. Degas used rapid studies like these to build visual memory from life, following his teacher Ingres's command to draw constantly. They are the raw material behind his most celebrated paintings of Parisian performance.

Written by LinkedCulture for its video on this object. Machine-generated (claude-sonnet-4-6), not yet reviewed by a person. It is not part of the museum’s record.

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Object ID
e4c3405b-1e3e-4a52-b53a-f8f3e8c12082
Object Type
Drawing
  • Getty Museum field “Object Type” · copied as is
Creator
Edgar Degas
  • Getty Museum field “Artist/Maker” · copied as is
Culture
French
  • Getty Museum field “Culture” · copied as is
Department
Drawings
  • Getty Museum field “Department” · derived by LinkedCulture from the museum field · Getty's classification category is stored as department.
Credit Line
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
  • Getty Museum field “Standard Credit Line” · the first available of several museum fields
  • Getty Museum field “Source Credit Line” · the first available of several museum fields
Date
1877
  • Getty Museum field “Date” · copied as is
Begin Year
1877
  • Getty Museum field “produced_by.timespan.begin_of_the_begin” · derived by LinkedCulture from the museum field
End Year
1877
  • Getty Museum field “produced_by.timespan.end_of_the_end” · derived by LinkedCulture from the museum field

The museum’s own record has not been captured for this object yet, so the museum fields shown above are limited to values LinkedCulture stored unchanged.

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Sketches of Café Singers

Oct 13, 2026 · Short

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