Image source: Wikimedia Commons (Public domain). View source
The Dance Class
- Artist
- Edgar Degas (1834–1917)
- Date
- 1874
- Dimensions
- 83.5 x 77.2 cm
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Location
- Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, United States
The Dance Class shows young ballerinas of the Paris Opéra gathered in a rehearsal room at the end of a lesson. The elderly ballet master Jules Perrot, leaning on his tall stick, watches a dancer performing her steps.
A closer look
Around the single performer, the other girls wait, chat, scratch their backs, adjust their earrings or fidget with their sashes, tired and distracted. Degas was fascinated less by the glamour of the stage than by the unguarded moments behind it. The room opens diagonally into depth, and the figures are cut off at the edges as in a snapshot. Look closely at the left: a small dog sniffs at the feet of a girl sitting on the piano. The bright tutus glow against the green-grey walls.
