Edgar Degas

Edgar Degas, an unrelenting artist, worked extensively in the fields of oil, pastel, charcoal, sculpture and printmaking in his work. Degas can be fully taken in and understood by walking through the wide-range collection of his featured art located at the Yale Museum of Art. Although considered a true impressionists, he infused his own unique trademarks, subject matter, and his artistic sensibility created in his legendary style. While aspiring artists are able to attend schools including Pratt Institute, Rhode Island School of Design, or Corcoran College of Art and Design, in the early nineteenth century, artists were allowed to copy pieces composed by other artists. Through working off another talented artist, Degas was able to develop his own skills. At the young age of eighteen, he was allowed the honor of copying famous pieces at the Louvre in Paris. In 1854, Degas copied Raphael’s paintings featured at the Louvre, which allowed for him to not only study Raphael’s techniques used in painting, but also furthered his abilities in the art field. With the intention of experiencing a different style of art, mainly studying religious art, Degas traveled to Italy in the mid 1800’s to acquire a vast amount of knowledge not present to him in Paris, which would allow for him to build upon his career at a young age. Returning to Paris, he composed his first major piece known as A Woman Seated Beside a Vase of Flowers.

Quotes from Edgar Degas:

"A painting requires a little mystery, some vagueness, some fantasy. When you always make your meaning perfectly plain you end up boring people."

"Painting isn't so difficult when you don't know ... But when you do ... it's quite a different matter!"

"A painting is above all a product of the artist's imagination, it must never be a copy. If, at a later stage, he wants to add two or three touches from nature, of course it doesn't spoil anything. But the air one sees in the paintings of the masters is not the air one breathes."

"Drawing is not what one sees but what one can make others see."

"How awful it is not being able to see clearly any more! I have had to give up drawing and painting and for years now content myself with sculpture ... But if my eyesight continues to dim I won't even be able to model any more. What will I do with my days then?"