Ballet Rehearsal on Stage
(Repetition d'un Ballet sur la Scène)
by Edgar Degas, 1874

This is what is hanging in our living room, but you all knew that.

Kat

Yeah, that guy in the corner always creeped me out.

Now that guy is creepy, huh?

You used to love to peek into your grandpa's room to see the ballerina picture and we called you Tina, Tina, Ballerina. And now you are creeped out.

Sheeeesh!

I've found a phantom foot in the painting! In the lower left hand corner. It's the same color as the floor, so it might just be a random blotch, but it certainly looks like a foot to me.

And as to your comment, Mum, I think I mostly liked to look at it because it confused me. Like, the ballerina sitting on the edge of the bench? I was trying to figure out why her feet were so small--I didn't realize that those were the legs of the bench. And the ballerina lacing her shoes or fixing her stockings or whatever...I thought she was a midget with hair covering her face. And the creepy guy in the corner, of course. I know these are weird points to be confused about, but I was young and apparently I had a weird grasp of reality.

I think it is a remnant of an earlier version. It's possible that in the course of time it has become more visible as the underlying paint (or crayon sketch - btw, never use crayon in paintings! sketches may be done with charcoal) has started to shine through. Similar traces can be found under the dress of the sitting ballerina, which also seems to have been lower in an earlier version, and the elbow, which originally was more to the right.

When I was 14 and was accepted into a Jr. Company ballet, I loved Degas. After a few months in the company dancing three hours a day with my fellow ballerinas and splitting an apple for a snack, it became glaringly apparent to us that those Degas ballerinas were HIDEOUSLY OBESE! Ho-hum: such is the predictable nature of the body-image-confused young teen. Happily, now I love Degas.

I think my favorite, though, remains Monet. When I was even younger and taking ART lessons, I used to have my mom drive me every weekend to the St. Louis Art Museum so I could look at the Monet paintings. I believe one of the first books I ever bought was a tiny Monet book. I loved the way he used color, but most of all, I loved the way he dared to paint differently, and in my mind, his paintings were even more vibrantly beautiful than photographs or more realistic paintings of the same locations. It may sound simple, but since I, too, felt different as a child--different from my friends and different from my family--I took solace in Monet's difference. If he could be himself so beautifully, maybe I could be myself, however different, beautifully as well.

The National Galleries in DC has a huge Degas collection with many of the wax sculptures he made. Check it out if you ever get a chance. I was very impressed with the place. There are two buildings, the east building holds modern art and is a wonderful modern sunlit building. I found myself liking the building better than the art though.

The west building is an absolute treasure. This is where they keep the good stuff. I was very impressed but I did not spend enough time there because I was only out in DC for a training and had to hop a plane back to Chicago. I did enjoy seeing all those wonderful pieces like the Monumental sculpture from the Renaissance, a Da Vinci, The Audobon Birds of America, Pieter Claesz and more.

I simply did not have enough time to take it all in. There is also some great online resources to check out if you are not in DC. Here is more information about the ballerinas exhibits.



Apparently the dudes in formalwear were the girls "protectors." No wonder the ballerinas look so uncomfortable. hmmmmm

Kat

The impact of sculpture of any kind didn't really hit me until I saw it in person. I didn't hold as much appreciation for Rodin's "The Kiss," for example, until I saw it up close in London. Those pictures looked promising, though! I think it's interesting, too, that there was an entire ballerina culture to depict. Sometime when I'm in DC I'll have to check that museum out. As for admiring the buildings more than anything in them, I know just what you mean! The High Museum here in Atlanta is often itself the highlight of visiting it.