Heller-Germain Edgar de Ga, or Edgar Degas (Fr. Edgar Degas; July 19, 1834, Paris - September 27, 1917) - French painter, one of the most prominent and original representatives of the Impressionism.

Biography and creativity

Degi was born on July 19, 1834 in Paris, in a secured family of the aristocratic origin of Auguste de Ha and Celestina Musion. He was the eldest of five children. At the age of 13, Edgar lost his mother, which became a serious blow to him. Later, in the youth, under the influence of new social ideas, Edgar changed his surname with de ga on less "aristocratic" Degas.

The Father of the artist, Auguste de Ga, managed the French branch of a large bank founded in Italy, Deant Edgar Degi, Renele Heller de Ga. Ilher de Ha emigrated to Italy during the years French revolution, believing that his life is in danger. Mother Edgar, Celestina Musson, was from the French family, settled in America. Her father was a broker on a cotton stock exchange in New Orleans.

Early period

The desire to draw the beginning to manifest itself from Dega in childhood. However, his father sucks him a lawyer's career, however, Edgar did not have a lot of desire and abilities to jurisprudence, and the security of the family allowed him to engage in painting, not particularly worrying about feeding. Not needing acutely in money, Degas could afford not to sell his work and work over them again and again, striving for perfection. Degi was an obvious perfectionist who gives in his passion to perfect harmony to loss of the feeling of reality. Already at the beginning of his long creative path Degas was an artist who, as he was joking, only by filing the picture, it was possible to stop working on it.

In 20 years (1854), Degas enroll in the workshop in the workshop of the artist of the Lame, which, in turn, the student of the Great Engra. In a familiar family of degius, Engra happened, and he had long retained his appearance in his memory, and for his life he had retained the love of the Engrovsky singer line and clearly. Degi loved other great drawers - Nikola Poussna, Hans Golbien - and copied their work in the Louvre with such diligence and skill, which was difficult to distinguish a copy of the original.

Louis Lamot - the figure for those times is quite well known, although in our time the work of this artist is almost forgotten. Lamot managed to transfer the Degi Love for clear contours that the Engr himself was so appreciated. In 1855, Degas managed to see himself with Engrom, who was 75 years old, and even get advice from him: "Draw a line, a young man, as much as possible, in memory or from nature." Kurba and Delacroix had a certain influence on the work of Degas, but the Angg was actually recognized by the authority to the end of the life for the artist.

Edgar studied the creations of great masters of painting in Louvre, during his life several times visited Italy (where his relatives lived along the father's line), where he had the opportunity to get acquainted with the masterpieces of the Masters of the Italian Renaissance. Special interest in the painter caused such old Italian masters as grinding, Bellini, Girlandiao and Jotto. During this period, Andrea Manteny and Paolo Veronese becomes idle and colorful painting of which literally struck the young artist. For its early work, a sharp and accurate drawing is characterized by a sharp observation, combined with the noble-discreet manner of the letter (sketches of the brother, 1856-1857, Louvre, Paris; Figure Head Baronesses Belleli, 1859, Louvre, Paris), then with tough realistic truthfulness Performances (portrait of an Italian bench, 1857, private collection).

At the turn of the 60s of the XIX century, Edgar Dega opens his own workshop in Paris. The basis of his creativity was portrait painting, but a lot of attention was given to the historical canvases. While in Italy, Degas wrote a number of portraits, which depicts members of his family. After that, for several years, the portrait remained one of his strong hobbies, alternating with historical themed. However, at the beginning of the 1860s, Degas again became interested in scenes from modern life, and first of all jumps.

Historical canvas

It was complex, great work, with the help of which the artist hoped to become famous by putting them in the cabin. A young artist who wants to exhibit in the cabin, in the first half of the sixties, appeals to historical plots: "Young Spartans, causing to the contest of the young men" (1860), "Semiramid lays the city" (1861), "Alexander and Bucuofal" (1861-1862) , "Jeffea's daughter" (1859-1860), "Episode of the Medieval War" ("Disaster Orleans") (1865). Pictures are dark in color, dry in shape. In the first of the listed paintings of human figures on the canvas, they are deprived of exquisite grace, they cutting and angular, the action unfolds against the background of a conventional everyday landscape.

In fact, Degi never finished any of these works, despite numerous preparatory drawings and outline oil. For example, in the "Youth Spartans" exercises, he neglected historical accuracy so that in a different and clearly in modern presentation ancient history. He painted the whole picture in the classically strict spirit of Poussin, but gave the characters of the features of the "Children of Montmartre", the features of the people who are familiar to him by the Parisian people. In "Semiramide, Building Babylon", Degi created an exciting original work, but it seemed he himself was not confident in the right direction of his search. The desire to achieve extremely perfect art played with a degious joke: the movement to the ideal was for the artist in itself. Such work gave a reason for conversations about failures or the insolvency of Degas in this genre. However, it is impossible, however, it is not noticed that literally on several canvases, he suggested an independent solution to the problem, which was not under the power of others, failed to fill the plot with their own images.

Portrait of a Bellie family

Trips in Italy and the influence of the Italian painters of the XV century. Affiliate Degas on the creation of a group portrait of Bellel family. Classic traditions in the composition on this canvas are adjacent to characteristic characters, which is positively distinguished by the artist. At this impressive group portrait, Aunt Degas Laura with her husband, Baron Jennaro Belleli, and two children. Laura is pregnant with a third child, although black dress hides her position. At that time, she continued to wear mourning on her father, grandfather Degas, who died quite recently - his portrait hanging behind the laur. Dega began writing this picture in 1858, when he was visiting his relatives in Florence. Here he made a lot of preliminary sketches, but the final version wrote after returning to Paris in 1859. By that time, this portrait was the most ambitious work of the artist. The figures are shown here almost in a natural value, and the picture itself looks carefully thought out. The power and depth of the composition detect the artist's desire to follow the samples of the Italian Renaissance and the traditions of the older generation masters, primarily Engru, which once also created a number of outstanding portraits in Italy. At the same time, the picture is distinguished by freshness and individual view of the artist. Posses standing on the portrait of people non-traditional, and in general, the canvas transmits the atmosphere of strong relativesAlthough in fact the laurra marriage could not be called happy.

Here is another description of this picture by the connoisseur and expert of art: "In comparison with the official salon portrait painting, for which the photographic accuracy, photographic setting and accuracy of the snapshot were an indispensable condition for aesthetics, the picture in their courage and truth meant a real revolution. The figures do not positive both in modern photographs and mid-quality salon portraits. Only Giovanna, one of the daughters, looks at the imaginary viewer, the remaining figures are focused on each other. Baroness is free, she has proud, straight and reference posture. Little Julia snapped at the time of minute emotion. She sits on the edge of the chair, the left leg is hidden - the reception of the master who he transmits spontaneous immediacy. For academic painting of that time, it was an explicit desecration of shrines ... In this picture, a hint of TU Manera has already appeared, which will then hit the degi, when in any motive he will beless to remain only for himself "(E. Hutinger).

Impressionists and Degas.

Edgar Degas. Right horses in front of the stands. 1869-1872 Orsay Museum, Paris.

In 1861, Degas meets Edward Mana, friendship with which continued until the end of the last life. Being a person is very authoritative in the environment of young artists, the informal head of the Batinol Group, Mane introduced a degiousness with young painters who later famous as impressionists. In the few circles that united artists, Degi had an unconditionally high reputation due to its manners, fine culture, courtesy, a peculiar, combined with sharpness, charm - all this caused a well-known respect for him.

With Edward Mana Dega races the overall rejection of academic salon art. Degi was more interested in modern life in all its manifestations, rather than the exhausted plots of paintings in the cabin. He also did not accept the desire of impressionists to work outdoors, preferring the world of the theater, opera and cafeshantane. Moreover, he did not like the Plenuer, believing that attention was dispersed in the air, and unconditionally preferred a managed studio environment. Because the degious style was based on a beautiful drawing, its paintings have an accuracy of the image, completely atypical for impressionism.

Adhering to sufficiently conservative views both in the field of politics and in personal life, Degas was extremely ingenious in search of new motives of his paintings, using unexpected persons and enlarged plans ("Miss Lala in Circus Fernando", 1879, National Gallery, London). "Caught moments" - so, perhaps, it would be possible to put it on many works of Edgar Degas. This is his deep internal affinity with impressionists. They were all poets of a stray, rolling world, everyone understood life as a permanent movement. And if the landscape players have compiled through the movement of air, light, the time of day and year, through the permanent cycle of nature, then the degi sought to convey the living essence of the world through the human movement.

The 1860s in France were marked by the suggestion of the young progressive intelligentsia by the bourgeois environments of Napoleon III Empire. The new wave of artists broke traditional ideas about painting, about plots and character heroes, introducing simple scenes in their circle from the life of Napoleon France. The manner and the brightness of their creativity was close to Edgar Degas. He, however, in contrast to the impressionists, was more social artist; Departing from the traditions of classicism and romanticism of the old schools of France's painting, he paid more attention not to distracted everyday images of modern life, but on the plots associated with the everyday, often hard work of his contemporaries.

Impressionists paid more attention to the light (here you can recall the pictures of Mana and Monet), Edgar Degas, in turn, paid more attention to movement.

Even a certain success historical picture Degi " Unfortunately of the city of Orleans"In the cabin of 1865, he did not beat the artist of a conscious desire to portray modern life In his new, somewhat revolutionary manner for that time.

Critics are often converged that, despite the unwillingness of Degas (unlike impressionists) to work at the Captivity, fundamentally their creativity is generally very similar, which, in turn, allows you to rank Edgar Degi to the circle of impressionists. At the same time, Dega himself rejected the term "impressionism", as well as some principles of creativity of innovators, and by the end of their lives were distant from their society. It remains to recall that the division of painting, as well as painters on styles, is always very conditional. The names of the directions and styles, as a rule, random, appeared and fastened spontaneously, and little they say about the point of art, which is called. Rather, we are talking about some common for the era of a gust, expressed by each artist individually and peculiar.

Franco-Prussian War

In 1870, the wave of the Franco-Prussian war went to Paris. Just like Mana, Degas wrote down by a volunteer in the army. He served in infantry and artillery. Degi recorded a volunteer to the infantry regiment, but at the first shooting it was found that the artist sees the right eye, it was the beginning of a disease that turned around at the end of life with almost full blindness. Because of weak vision, Degi was translated into an artillery regiment.

Edgar Degas. The washing up. 1886 Hill Stand Museum, Farmington, Connecticut, USA.

Seventies and exhibitions Impressionists

At the end of the war, Degas visited the UK, then visited the United States, where his relatives on the maternal line lived. In 1871, when the war ended, the artist made a short trip to London, and in the winter of 1872-1873 spent several months in New Orleans, from his American relatives. One of the cousins \u200b\u200bof Edgar, Estelle Musson, was blind, and Degas experienced a special sympathy for her, already the more presentation that he himself could soon lose sight.

In 1873 the artist returned to Paris. For him come hard times: His father died, leaving big debts. According to other sources, debts were a consequence of unsuccessful transactions on the American Cotton Exchange of the Degi Brothers who were inherited by the brokerage office of their uncle. Wishing to preserve a family reputation, Degas paid part of the debt from his money that was inherited, but this was not enough. He had to not only sell the house and the collected father of the collection of paintings of old masters, but for the first time to think about selling their own works. As the way, it was impossible to get acquainted with Impressionists - Degi participated in almost all of their exhibitions since 1874.

Between 1874 and 1886, eight exhibitions of Impressionists took place, and Degas took part in seven of them, missing only the penultimate, in 1882. Being an outstanding draftsman, Degas knew how to portray modern life with skill, worthy of brush artists of the old days. The financial crisis, which Degi survived after the death of his father, was after several years in a tense, daily work Overlooked, and by 1880, Degas became a noticeable and respected figure in the Paris World Arts. After the final exhibition of Impressionists in 1886, the artist stopped publicly exposing his work, preferring to sell paintings written by him at a high price through several trading agents.

Dancer Degas

The extraordinary popularity of ballet scenes, captured Degas, is easily explained, since the artist shows us the world of grace and beauty, without falling into excessive sentimentality. The life of the ballet is transferred to them so brightly, which can be easily represented as far as fresh and original it seemed to these pictures of Degi contemporaries. Artists who wrote ballet to Degas or built the geometrically the right compositions, or depicted ballet stars bowed in an elegant worship. Such portraits resembled photos of Hollywood movie stomen, made for the cover of the glossy magazine.

"They call me a painter of dancers," wrote Degas. He really often appealed to this topic. But it is completely incorrect to think that Degas was Eotoman. "Ballerina has always been for me only a pretext to portray wonderful fabrics and grab the movement," said Degas.

An interesting entry from the "Diary" Edmon de Gonkura, made on February 13, 1874: "Yesterday I spent the whole day in the workshop amazing artist named Degas. After many attempts, experiments, prostrates in all directions, he fell in love with everything modern, and in this modernity stopped his glance on the gratings and dancers. In essence, the choice is not so bad. All - white and pink; The female body in a batter and gas is the most charming reason for the use of light and gentle tones ... Before our eyes are the dancers ... The picture depicts a ballet foyer, where on the background of a light window, fantastic outlines of the feet of dancers, descending on the stairs, are identified; Among all these inflating white clouds, the red plaid spot is rewing, and a ridiculous figure of the balletmaster acts as a sharp contrast. And we appear graceful bends of bodies, turns and movements of these young girls, turns in nature. Shows his paintings, from time to time completing the explanations to the reproduction of some choreographic figure, imitation, speaking by the language of dancers, one of the arabesque. And truly funny see how he standing on socks, with his hands listed above his head, mixes aesthetics of dance with aesthetics of painting, arguing about the unclean tones of Velasquez and the silhouette of Manteny. "

Once, Antoine Watto, amateur theater plots, preferred to draw charming frivolous ladies and elegant melancholic boys in the tired sacrifices, who were visible symbol of the beauty of the conditional and fragile world - the beautiful, sacrifice of the beauty and fragile world everyday life. Being an impeccable observer, DEGA dispersed that he had never been awarded the attention of the artists of the past: the movement of the hand of some sitting ladies, or left by someone binoculars, or a lonely fan, forgotten on a chair a young girl. Could Antoine Watto afford to portray the stage, looking at her through hundreds of spectators sitting in the hall, to portray not the act of itself, and the profile of a random neighbor, an unwittingly overhearding the conversation and the facial expressions of the interlocutors? Edgar Degas perceived theater just like that. On the theme of dancers of Degas, to a strong degree, influenced onion houses. In his lithographs, he just depicted casual, grated from the general plan of theatrical scenes, the face he turned into grotesk masks resembling theatrical masks Callo.

Fragile and weightless figures of ballerinas appear in front of the viewer in the twilight of dance classes, then in the light of sofes on stage, then in short moments of rest. The apparent idleness of the composition and the uninterested position of the author create the impression of a peeled alien life ("Dance class", 1873-1875; "Dancer on stage", 1878 - both at the Orsha Museum, Paris; "Dancers at Rehearshes", 1879, GMIA, Moscow; " Blue dancers", 1890, Orsa Museum, Paris). The same detachment is observed at Degas and in the image of nude.

Many times mentioned about the detachment of the degi in relation to his models. In fact, the image of dancers in the pictures of the degi is devoid of erotic feeling or feeling of any personal human contact. Some connoisseurs of degious creativity believe that you can see the contrast between the impassive objectivity in the drawing of characters - and warm, living feeling, spilled in the very painting. This statement may be close to objectivity where we are talking about flavoring the background, but the statement that the pictures of the degi carry in themselves and a thin, slightly sad irony of the artist, and his deep tenderness to models, similar to the emotionality of the art historian himself and cannot Be proved. In general, the sphere of feelings in painting of many artists is not expressed directly, and all the descriptions of the spectrum of emotions seem to be existing in one or another picture, only fantasies that cannot be proven nor refuted. This is their strength and weakness.

Image of cafeshnants in degious work

The most accurate certificate of cafesmans belongs to the brush of the aristocrat and the frequenter of elegant salons of Monceu Monso Edgar Dega, ahead of Toulouse-Lotter for a decade. For last third XIX century, before the appearance of cinema, the cafesmans remained a favorite place of rest Parisian. These institutions were very diverse and met everywhere, as in our days, cinemas: on Montmartre, Strasbourne Boulevard, on the Champs Elysees and in the suburbs. The most attractive were, of course, those that opened in the summer, on fresh airIn gardens illuminated by white gas balls.

Degi, not loved open space, I preferred artificial lighting, gas backlight helped him find new solutions. He said to his friends-impressionists: "You need a natural life, I am artificial." Nevertheless, the scenes from the life of kafesantanes on his canvases were responsible for the first task supplied by impressionists in front of them, to reflect modernity. Democraticity and even some vulgarity of the cafeshens attracted him. Such an atmosphere was amused and entertained Degas. There were extraordinary personalities: the wisewriter, the eccentrics, patriot, peasants, sentimental ladies, epileptics ... The types of such a kind exist so far, and, if you think about, any modern star Estrades can be found to one of these categories. Dega had no preferences; He willingly visited both elegant places on the Champs Elysees, La Rock, Ba Ta-Clan, Elizhe Montmartre, and the dubious Kabaki Belleville and La Wist, where unusual silhouettes attracted him.

Personal life

In the personal life of Degi was both restrained and hot-tempered; It happened with anger attacks. Friends and members of his family responded about degi as awkward live person. And indeed, once he was called "bearish" for frequent grumbling and grumbling. The degiousness of the degass to his own body was free from conventions. In fact, the bath, which we often see on its numerous late pictures of washable women, was boldly put in the middle of the workshop. It was also known as a capable Mimic actor.

No evidence of the desire of a degass is not preserved to physical proximity to ballet dancers or any of his simulators, however, as any other information about the personal life of the artist. Nobody knew whether Dega had a mistress. Degas him never talked about his relationship with women.

Cotton Office

Upon returning to France, Dega creates " Cotton office"(1873), picture, wonderful composition, expression, light and color. This picture of Degas wrote during a trip to his relatives to New Orleans. The plot chosen to them for their web, - the business office - all artists thoroughly went around. The exact portraits of the characters are superbly inscribed in the atmosphere of the business situation, and in general the picture is a live sketch. everyday life, Eminently rather with the novels of Emil Zol, than most of the works of modern degasses of painters. New Orleans was at that time the fourth largest city in the United States, and as the seaport roldied with the main port of the country, New York. The basis of the prosperity of the city was a trade in cotton. Degi wrote to her friend: "One cotton. Everyone here live only by cotton and for cotton. " In the foreground, the picture is sitting uncle Degas, Michel Musion, a cotton exchange broker; Brother of the artist, Rene de Ga, depicts the reading newspaper, and his other brother, Achille de ha, leaned against the partition in the background on the left. Rene and Achill were engaged in imports of wine to New Orleans, and Degas were proud of their success. Here, in the office of uncle, they just looked for a while and therefore idle, while everyone else is busy work. Although the work makes the impression of spontaneity, its composition has been thought out as carefully as on all the canvas. For example, dressed in black figures are placed so that it is vividly stand out in the background and as if they perform from the picture. Later he writes a portrait of the artist Lepica ("Square of Concord") - to a certain extent a revolutionary type of portrait art, when the surroundings of the main (conditional) character has no less weight, value and value than the hero of the portrait.

"Store Study"

Works from the Montmartra sketch series were performed to order for the luxurious publication "Cardinal Family", conceived by Louis Gallevi. To this end, they were collected many etudes, lithographs, monotypes and drawings. The topic was interested in Degas, and he continued to develop it with enthusiasm, in the spirit of Rabel, which is the more strange, since Alevi soon refused his plan. During the life of the degi, these work done on the ambulance hand saw only a few lucky ones, among whom was delighted with Renoir. Vollaru managed to get several drawings to use them as illustrations to the "Top Center" Maupassant and "Grimaces Kurtisanok" Pierre Louis. Only thanks to such a happy coincidence of circumstances, this little-known side of Degi's creativity has reached us. Under the pretext of the desire to leave the memory of the brother of an unmailing René de He after his death destroyed most The drawings found by him in the workshop of Edgar.

Vollar, always slowly carrying out his plans, published the "Store of the Teling" with the illustrations of Degas only in 1934. The book turned out amazing; Having bought an instance, Picasso considered her pearl in his meeting. Later he bequeathed her Louvra, where she still exhibits in his personal collection.

Pastels Degas

Pastel consists of painting pigment in powder mixed with small quantity Adhesive (usually gumiarabic) and compressed in the form of chalk. Pastel can give a very saturated and very weak tone, but it has a big drawback: the pastel layer applied to the surface is extremely short-lived and with the slightest touch can collapse. In order to avoid this, the surface is treated with a special composition that protects the drawing, but the colors at the same time will noticeably dump. Using pastel artists began at the end of the XV century, and in the XVIII century pastel was in a special fashion, and above all in portrait painting. Then a period occurred when she was forgotten about pastels, and the interest in it was again awakened only in the second half of the XIX century. Some leading artists-Impressionists willingly used Pastel, appreciate her for the freshness of the tone and speed, with what she allowed them to work.

Over the years, the degi increasingly gives preference to pastels, often in combination with monotype, lithography or gouache. Pastel attracts Masters nobility, purity and freshness of color, velvety surface of texture, liveliness and strolling stroke vibration. No one could compare in the mastery of Pastel's Pastel from Degas, who used it with power and ingenuity, which did not reach any of his contemporaries. Degas - a thin colorist, its pastels are harmonious, light, then, on the contrast, are built on sharp color contrasts. Its paintings seem randomly grated from the flow of life scenes, but the "random" is the fruit of a well-thought-out composition, where the cut fragment of the figure, the building emphasizes the impelicness of the impression.

The daga manner was distinguished by amazing freedom, he imposed pastel bold, broken strokes, sometimes leaving a tone of paper that appears through pastels or adding smears with butter or watercolor. One of the discoveries of the artist was the processing of painting by steam, after which the pastel softened and it could be chosen with a brush or fingers. In their later works that resemble a festive kaleidoscope of lights, Degi was obsessed with the desire to transfer the rhythm and the movement of the scene. To give paints a special shine and make them glow, the artist dissolved pastel hot water, turning it into a kind of oil paint, and brushing it on canvas. Late Degi works are also highlighted by the intensity and wealth of color, which are complemented by the effects of artificial lighting, enlarged, almost planar forms, the constraint of the space that gives it a stress-dramatic character ("blue dancers", pastel, State Museum fine arts, Moscow).

Degi not only used pastel techniques in a new way, but also created a picture with its help, superior to the size of the works of other artists performed by pastel. Sometimes he stitched together several sheets together to get the surface of the size of it. In their recent work Pastel, fulfilled when his vision strongly weakened, majestic forms are almost completely dissolved in a fire of flaming paints. American Art Historian George Cheerd Hamilton wrote about these works of Degas: "The flavor of his paintings was the last and the greatest gift Artist modern art. Even with a losing sight of Dega palette remained close to the palette of the walkers. "

Pastel technique allowed a jelly to clearly show his talent of the draftsman, his love for the expressive line. At the same time, the juicy tones and the "shimmering" barcode pastels helped the artist to create the special colorful atmosphere, the one-handed airiness, which so distinguishes his work. Peering in Pastels, with special clarity, aware of the essence of new gains of painting. The color here as it may occur on your eyes from the transfusion radiance, from the flowing stream of rainbow "elementary particles", from the vortex of the intersecting "power" lines. Everything here is full of meaningful movement. Running lines give rise to a form, color is born from the vortex of colorful strokes. It is especially noticeable in the "blue dancers" from the Moscow Museum, where from the rainbow flickering of pure tones, as it may arise a dance melody. Among the ten works of Edgar Degi stored in russian museums, Only one ("Dancer at the photographer" from the Museum of Fine Arts named after A. S. Pushkin) is written by oil paints. The remaining pastels are made.

For all his life, Degas created great amount Preparatory sketches and completed works. His graphic work They can serve as a certificate of creative growth, which artist passed, they clearly demonstrate how the master was pastel compositions with the image of dance scenes from individual sketches, movements and pos. In these works, the colorsist approach of the author is much bolder than in his picturesque works. In them, he used the color free and horsepha.

Later creativity

By the end of the 80s, Degas, essentially, implemented his desire to "become famous and unknown." He was practical and knew how to dispose of his influence, constantly contacted many artists, and such activity began to annoy some of his colleagues. As an unnecessary proof that he is confident in his talent and calm for his position, the degi closes in a narrow circle of close friends. It is only exhibited in a few chosen public places, which is of interest to him from the respectable art journals of Paris. The productivity of the degius is growing, the number of completed works intended for sale, at the same time he carefully plans with a group of reliable traders its strategy at the auction. The most prominent of them was Durane-Ruel, with whom Degi met in the early 70s. Degi realized the pressure of the commercial press and, apparently, was distinguished between the "goods oriented", as he called, and the rest of his own works. The first were primarily characterized by a high degree of finish, the second were clearly more avant-garde. Several of them were in the Gallery of Teo Van Gogh (Vincent Brother). Although the degi continued further from the prominent and active role that he played in the community of Paris artists, his influence on the younger generation increased. Degi never had any disciples, but many artists, for example, Paul Gauguin, Georges Sere, Henri Toulouse-Lotrek, recognized his influence on their art.

Evaluate the works of Degas are not easy. The fact is that somewhere in 1886 he stopped using notebooks, namely, the researchers have drawn a lot of information about early periods His creativity. Since the 90s, the work of the degi carry the imprint of an aging person, whose body, soul, the moral spirit has undergone in the last twenty-seven years of life with serious tests. The wit and humor changed to a more serious tone, the creative productivity gradually decreased due to the coming blindness. It was noted that in the works of this period, the degiousness was delivered to tribute to abstract elements of his art. The intensity of color has increased, and the line has become more energetic and has acquired greater expressiveness. Although the space, as before, remained theatrical (unreal) or indefinite, figures, now it was mostly bathripers, also did not spare time, they do not effortlessly cope with their weakened bodies. Nevertheless, there is a strong, unreleased will of the artist himself. Often et. late work Interpretation as just the result of the old ailments of the artist, oppressed by the progressive blindness, which became intolerable, who suffered from Melancholi and loneliness, which turned into anti-Semite under the influence of Dreifus's case. Yes, everything that has been said is true, but also the fact that Degas did not lose the flexibility of the mind, remained a bright contradictory person, looking for new paths in art.

By 1882, the artist begins to sharply deteriorate vision, and Degas began to turn to pastel technology, and then to sculpture. The figures depicted on his late canvases are always enlarged as if the artist considers them from a very close distance. Edgar Dega was practically universal artist Not only in terms of genres, but also in terms of technology in which he performed his work. Gradually, the degi almost completely passes from oil to pastels, since this technique allowed him to feel the immediate proximity to the surface of the picture and allowed to strain their eyesight. But pastel rolls out from the picture, it must be fixed with a special solution, and as a result, the paints are darked. Therefore, as a result, Degas invented his way to make oil according to the characteristics close to pastels, and began to write oil in the pastel technique.

Sculptures of Degas

Sculpt the small wax sculptures of Degi began in the late 1860s, and as his eyesight had a worse, the artist paid more attention to this genre. The themes of the Julptures of Degi repeated the themes of his paintings - dancers, swimsters or gopsery. These works of Degi looked for themselves, they replaced him with etudes, and only a few sculptures he brought to the end. Over the time, the degi is increasingly and more often appeals to the sculpture, because here it can more rely on the touch than almost lost vision. It was not engaged in the metal and stone for the metal and stone: he did only sculptures from soft materials exclusively for himself. In the figures of ballerin, swimsters, horses (often etudes on the modeling) of the degi sought a plastically expressive transmission of instantaneous movement, sharpness and surprises of the posture, while maintaining plastic wholeness and structural structures.

Bartolome's sculptor supported by a sculptor, Degas created a large number of Wax and clay figures of dancers and horses. Degas appreciated wax for his changeability, friends visiting the artist's workshop, sometimes found a wax ball on the spot: apparently, Degas considered his work unsuccessful. None of these sculptures, with the exception of the "little fourteen-year-old dancers," Degas never exhibited. After the death of Degi in his workshop, about 70 preserved works were found, and the artist's heirs transferred them to bronze, the Degas himself never worked with bronze. The first samples of these sculptures appeared in 1921. For many years, it was believed that the wax sculptures themselves, from which casting, could not continue, but they were found in the basement in 1954; As it turned out, specially made duplicates were used for casting. Next year, all the wax sculptures of the degi were bought by the American collector Mellon's field, which, giving a small part of the works of Louvru, still remains the owner of most of them. With each wax sculpture Approximately 20-25 castings were made, therefore, the total number of copies is about 1500. Some of them can be seen in large museums around the world, and in some places, for example, in the glipotek Nu Karlsberg, Copenhagen, there is their full set.

Figures of Degas

The drawing was the cornerstone of all degious creativity. The artist exercised his hand, working in the traditions of Engra, one of the most outstanding draftsmen in the history of European art. The degas helped the phenomenal visual memory and the congenital feeling of plastic line and contour. He was born for drawing.

In his early drawings, the degi sought stunning accuracy and naturalism, often using a pencil for this. However, in the 1870s, the artist's manner has become more free and smooth, at that time Degas almost completely refused pencil and moved to white chalk and black coal. The stunning effect, which he sought with the help of this technique, perfectly illustrates not dated "sketch with two riders." Degi used another letter of letters and very often combined different materials Within one work. Most degi drawings are sketches and sketches of human figures, such as, for example, a ballerina tie to the shoe ", 1880-1885. This drawing is made not so much a pencil as coal. Usually the artist made a number of preliminary sketches, and sometimes used the same etude for several different cauldron.

Innovation of degas

The art of degas is inherent in the combination of beautiful, sometimes fantastic, and prosaic. The passionate variety and mobility of urban life, he writes modern Paris (streets, theater, cafe, horse racing) in continuously alternating aspects. Production of degi, with their strictly verified composition (asymmetric, with dynamic fragment of the film), with their exact and flexible pattern, unexpected angles, active interaction of the shape and space (often as if turned onto a plane), combine seeming indifferentness and accidents with careful thoughtfulness and accurate calculation.

Degi sought to maximize "realistic" or "naturalistic" of his works. Despite the fact that these two terms often interchanged, in reality, naturalism was a more progressive form of realism, as it has been enriched with the newest achievements of science. The writer and journalist Edmond Du-Ranti, a friend of Degas, persistently called upon friends to follow the discoveries in science, use innovations so that the art of the artist went to the leg with time. The way degi followed this scientific realism, one can illustrate its attitude towards the demonstration of works at the exhibitions of impressionists.

Placing all the pictures of each artist in rooms with an intimate color scheme, with walls painted in unusual tones, the impact of which complemented the pictures, and extending the evening hours of visits when gas lamps were lit, degi and his colleagues created effects, acting in accordance with the latest openings of optical Physics. Like other impressionists, Diga attached great importance Ramam, he himself designed their color and outlines. As later explained Claude Monet, Degas did it in order to "make the frame to help the work and complement it", thus enhancing colors. Degi even specifically stipulated that the frames of his paintings should not change. When he once saw his picture inserted into the usual gilded lithuania, he himself acquired it in a rage.

The fact that the degas was fond of technical inventions show his engravings, it also used both traditional, for example, pastel and a temperature based on glue, and not oil. Both of these material are dry or fast drying, opaque, which allowed the degas easily to make changes to their compositions (and mask). Using their expressive potential for the image of the modern world of Opera and Cafeshantans, Degas made sure that the fragility of these materials is not suitable for transmitting the mumbling joys of performing arts.

The lack of a deep tradition in this technique allowed the degi freely to use for the base of paper, elastic and militant, which during work on the composition could be added or removed. In addition, it was used to create tonal planes, it was settled and their own fingers, with the help of a brush and water, it struck the pigments of pastel pencils erased into powder to get smooth overflows of paints. His efforts were crowned with the appearance of a new dictionary of realism, just as it was possible to make it in the modern literature to the brothers of Gonakram (Edmonu-Louis-Antoin and Julia-Alfred) and Emily Zola. Critics were compiled on the arbitrariness of strange review points, on cut forms and lower floors in its pictures. These elements were part of the ideology of realism-naturalism. In reality, their thorough preparation was hidden for the spontaneity of his compositions. Degi was, by definition of Edmon de Goncar, who visited the artist's workshop, "a man who is better than anyone else managed, transcribing modern life, to catch her soul."

Sunset

In almost ten years before his death, Degi practically stopped writing. He lived alone. While Renoir and Monet enjoyed the warmth of the family hearth, the degi lived more and more lonely in his bachelor apartment, littered with chaotic sticks of luxurious and dusty canvas, things and rare carpets. Death claimed many of his closest old buddies, and a bad character deprived the society of the few surviving friends. Paul Valerie, sometimes came to visit Degas in the workshop, left a description of the insideless existence of an almost blind artist who could no longer write, and only a little painted coal. However, by the 80 years he was already recognized artistHis paintings were sold on the fabulous prices for that time.

Edgar Dega died on September 27, 1917 in Paris at the age of 83, being a recognized master and a reputable painter, rightfully considered one of brightest representatives Impressionism, original Creator. According to the last will of the funeral, the funeral was modestly, although many old friends gathered on the last journey, among whom were Claude Monet and the artist Jean-Louis Forene. Degi asked not to utter mourning speeches during his funeral and especially insisted that if the Forew would have to say a few words, let it be the most simple phrase, sort of: "He, like me, loved to draw."

In honor of Edgar Degas called Crater on Mercury.

Creative manner

Degi was little interested in the landscape, which held a central place in the work of impressionists, and he did not strive to capture the easiest light and shadow on the canvas, so fascinating Monet. Degas grew up from traditional painting, which meant so little for other impressionists. Degi can be attributed to impressionism only due to the tremble, luminous game of paints. General, both for degi and for the rest of the impressionists, was, perhaps, only a greedy interest in the picturesque plots of modern life and the desire to capture her on the canvas some new an unusual way. Degi himself said: "We must have a high idea of \u200b\u200bart; It is not about what we do at the moment, but what would you like to achieve one day. Without it, you should not work. " Auguste Renoir said about his friend: "Degi was angry. Whether he was not hiding behind a black forward, a solid starch collar and cylinder revolutionary artist in all new painting?»

The irony of fate, but in the 1890s, after the decay of the group of impressionists, the work of the degi became closest in style precisely to impressionism. However, blurred forms and bright tones, which he began to use these years, were rather a consequence of the progressive loss of vision than the artist's desire to characteristic of flashes and forms. Spontaneity was not inherent in the artist, and he himself said: "Everything I do, I learned from old masters. I myself do not know anything about inspiration, nor about spontaneity or temperament. " Special drama images are very often born from an unexpectedly bold movement of lines, an unusual composition that resembles an instant photo, on which the figures with the individual parts of the body are shifted diagonally into the angle, the central part of the picture is free space (Opera Orchestra, 1868-1869, Orsa Museum, Paris; "Two Dancers on the Scene", 1874, Gallery of the Institute of Warburg and Kurto, London; Abstenle, 1876, OBSE Museum, Paris). To create a dramatic voltage, the artist also used a directional light, depicting, for example, a person separated by the spotlight into two parts: the illuminated and shaded ("Cafehestant in" Ambassador ", 1876-1877, the Museum of Fine Arts, Lyon;" Singer with Glove ", 1878 , Fogt Museum, Cambridge). This technique subsequently used A. de Toulouse-Lotrek in billboards for Moulin-Rouge.

Its observation gift, accuracy and township view were incomparable. And the power of visual memory could be compared only by the house. Degi's observation and phenomenal visual memory allowed him to capture gestures with an extraordinary accuracy, poses, grab the characteristic movements and transmit them with extraordinary truthfulness. Degi always thoughtfully thought out the composition of his paintings, often making many sketches and etudes, and in last years Life, when the fooling eyesight no longer gave him the opportunity to look for new topics, he again and again turned to his favorite images, sometimes converting the contours of the shapes from the old shelves using a copy paper.

The products of the degi with their strictly verified and at the same time dynamic, often asymmetric composition, an accurate flexible pattern, unexpected angles, active interaction of the figure and space combine the seeming imperfect and the randomness of the motive and architectonics of the picture with careful thoughtfulness and calculation. "There was no art, less directly than mine," the artist himself assesses his own creativity. Each of his work is the result of long observations and stubborn, painstaking work on their implementation into an artistic image. In the work of the masters there is nothing from the expression. Completion and thoughtfulness of its compositions causes sometimes to recall the Pussen's web. But as a result, images arise on canvas that will not be an exaggeration to be called an immacitation instantaneous and random. In french art end XIX. The century of the work of the degi in this respect is the diametrical opposite of creativity Cezanne. In Cesanna, the picture carries all the immutableness of the world order and looks fully completed by the microcosm. The degas it contains only a part of a cut-off frame of a powerful stream of life. Drug images are executed by dynamism, they embody the accelerated rhythms modern artist Epochs. It was the passion for the transfer of movement - this, according to the defined favorite stories of Degas: images of jumping horses, ballerinas at rehearsals, laundors and ironers for work, dressed or combing women.

Such methods suggest an accurate calculation rather than freedom and inspiration, but they also speak about the extraordinary ingenuity of the artist. IN creative search Degas acts as one of the most bold and original artists of their time. At the beginning of the professional path, the degi proved that it can write masterfully in the traditional manner of oil on the canvas, however mature years It is widely experimented with various techniques or with a combination of materials. It did not paint on the canvas more often, but on cardboard and used miscellaneous technique, for example, oil and pastel, within the same picture. A passion for the experiment was at the artist in the blood - no wonder in 1879, one of the observers who visited the exhibition of impressionists, wrote that Degas "without tired looking for a new technique."

The same creative was the artist's approach to engraving and sculpture. The manner of degi was influenced by different artists. He deeply read, for example, Engra, and himself ranked herself to writing in the traditional manner, which the Engr confessed. This effect is clearly visible in the early works of degasive, classic in spirit, with clearly discharged forms. Like many of his contemporaries, Degas experienced the influence of Japanese graphics with her unusual anglesTo which he had resorted in his subsequent work. In the pictures of Dega, there are a lot of traces of unexpected for European art fragmentedness on Japanese xylographics of Kamonovo. A photograph that Degas was fond of, made a fresh and unusual composition of his canvases. Some of his works create the impression of an instant image, but in fact this feeling is the fruit of the long and painstaking work of the artist.

Edmond Honkur wrote about Degas: "Man in high degree Sensitive, capturing the very essence of things. I have not met another artist who, reproducing modern life, would have grabbed her spirit. "In the end, Degas managed to develop his own, unique look at the impressions of the world around us. Sometimes it is called a cold, impassive observer, especially when writing female portraits, However, Berta Morizo, one of outstanding artist of that time, he said that Degas "sincerely admired the human qualities of young saleswoman in the store." Not many other artists studied so hard human bodylike degi. It is said that by the end of the session, the degi model was not only fatally tired of long posing, but also with painted stripes, which the artist crashes on their bodies as a markup that helped him more accurately determine the proportions.

"Throughout your life," Paul Valeri wrote, "Dega searched in the image of a naked figure considered from all points of view, in an incredible number of poses, in all sorts of movements, the only line of lines that would express the greatest accuracy of not only this moment , but also the greatest generalization. Neither grace nor imaginary poetry is included in his goal. His works are singing nothing. In the work it is necessary to leave some place the case so that some chairs arose, exciting artist, pick up his palette and guides his hand. But degi, a person in his own essentially volitional, not satisfying ever what happens immediately, who had too critical mind And too brought up the greatest masters, "never surrendered to direct pleasure in his work. I like this severity. "

Renoir once noticed that, "if Degi died fifty, he would remember him as a great artist, and nothing more. However, after fifty, his work was so expanded that he actually turned into Degas. " Perhaps, Renoir is not completely right. By the time Degas turned 30, he already created the canvas included in the treasury of world art. On the other hand, Renoir simply noticed that the mature works of the degi are more individual, they really "expanded" in style - this is distinguished by them first of all from the artist's early works. Continuing to believe in the fact that the drawing in painting is the basis of the foundations, the degi at the same time begins to take less about the beauty and clarity of the contour, expressing itself with the help of the diversity of shapes and richness of color.

Such an expansion of the style coincided with the increased interest of Degas to Pastels, which gradually became its main drawing material. In his paintings, the oil of Degas never sought to depict the broken texture, the beloved remaining impressionists, preferring to write in a calm even style. However, in the works pastel, the artist's approach becomes much bolder, and it uses the color as freely as it used it, working with chalk or coal. Pastel is in fact on the verge between the drawing and painting, and Degas himself said that she allows him to become a "colorist with a line."

Gallery

Absinthe, 1876, Orsay Museum, Paris

Before start, 1862-1880, OSA Museum, Paris Gladliners Ballet Star (Prima Ballerina) (1876-1878), Orsay Museum, Paris.

Two holidaymakers dancers (blue dancers) (1905-1910), Orsay Museum, Paris.

Blue dancers (1897), museum of arts them. A. S. Pushkin, Moscow

• Grains B. A. Degi. - M., L.: Soviet artist, 1965.
• Prokofiev V.N. Space in degii painting // Prokofiev V.N. About art and artistic. Articles different years. - M., 1985.
• Edgar Degi // Art Gallery, 4/2004, DEAGOSTINI.
• Kostonevich A. G. Edgar Degas. Consent area. Notes about the picture. - SPb.: State Hermitage, 2012. - 152 p., Il. - (Restricted masterpieces). - 1000 copies.

Peter Kiel.

Edgar Degas (1834-1917). Collection of paintings.

Edgar Dega was born in Paris in the family of an aristocrat who was successfully engaged in business, but died in 1873, all in debt. Brought up on painting great masters in Louvre and in Italy, where he showed a special interest in the works Early rebirth - Jotto, Girondayo, Manteny, Bellini, as well as Paolo Veronese, Degas, opening a workshop, thinks a number of historical canvases, which is connected with the need to put in the cabin for official recognition. Despite the most painstaking work, he truly did not finish any of the major calends.

At this time (1861), DEGA met with Edward Mana, who was older than two years old, practically peers, for whom the carways of Academism turned out to be alien. Mana has already had followers, future impressionists, but Degas, like Mana, are not enjoying new outdoor techniques. Figure is too important for him, the basis classical painting, and the balance of the plan. If the Impressionists were fond of the elusive game of light, the degi proceeded from nature, catching the elusive - movement, not just a gesture.

The death of the father forced Degas to pay part of his debts (he had brothers who, playing cotton's currency in the United States, may have ruined his father) and for the first time think about selling their paintings. At this time, quite by the way, a series of exhibitions of Impressionists began (from 1874 to 1886), on which Degas participated. The artist showed a business grip on sale of their paintings, for a family tradition.

The historical topics of classical art remained in the past. Like mana and impressinists, Dega proceeds from the impressions of current life and art. He attracted his ballet, this is the movement, the world of grace and femininity, life itself in all its manifestations.

"They call me a painter of dancers," wrote Degas and added. - "Ballerina has always been for me only a pretext to portray wonderful fabrics and grab the movement." Noteworth record in the "diary" Edmon de Gonkura dated February 13, 1874 as evidence of the starting fame of Degas: "Yesterday I spent a whole day in the workshop of an amazing artist named Degas. After many attempts, experiments, prostrates in all directions, he fell in love with everything modern, and in this modernity stopped his glance on the gratings and dancers. In essence, the choice is not so bad. All - white and pink; The female body in the batter and gas is the most charming reason for the use of light and gentle tones ...

Before our eyes are the dancers ... The picture depicts a ballet foyer, where on the background of a light window, fantastic outlines of the feet of dancers descending on the stairs are identified; Among all these inflating white clouds, the red plaid spot is rewing, and a ridiculous figure of the balletmaster acts as a sharp contrast. And we appear graceful bends, turns and movements of these little girls in nature.

The artist shows his paintings, from time to time complementing the explanations of the reproduction of some choreographic figure, imitation, speaking by the language of dancers, one of the arabesque. And truly funny see how he standing on socks, with his hands listed above his head, mixes aesthetics of dance with aesthetics of painting, arguing about the unclean tones of Velasquez and the silhouette of Manteny. "

Degi spoke to Impressionists: "You need a natural life, I am artificial." But here we are not so much about the please, not about lighting, but about art, about the habitat of citizens, visitors of the cafeshantans, ballet, or the same laundry and women, bringing the beauty of clothes and bodies. It should not be thought that the artist was Eotoman, to the naked female body, like dancers, he has an interest in purely aesthetic, artistic, otherwise all these series would be unbearable. He was fascinated by the elusive motion of the ballerina or women behind the toilet, the grace and beauty of life without the shadow of sentimentality and the beautifulness of the salon painting.

Degas was vertically challenged, Usually discreet, visited and quick-tempered. Close to find it awkwardly to speak directly and even grumble. At the same time, they celebrated the talent of the Mimic actor and even clown. French artist I am reminiscent of Valentina Serov.

Dega was not married. There are no information about the relationship between the artist with dancers and the simultaners, which indicates the impeccability of his behavior in relation to its models. Suggest that the degi received pleasure not from sexual intercourse, but contemplation female body. One does not exclude the other, especially for the artist who experienced catharsis is only as a result of hard work. Others express assumptions that Dega satisfied intimate needs with prostitutes, taking off with them incognito. You see, he from his youth wanted to be "famous and unknown", from his own words.

In the pastel technique, which corresponded to the talent of the draftsman, Degas reached unsurpassed mastery, which became his support with a weakening of vision, because of what he was engaged in sculpture. Colorful, the overflow palette grabs and recreates the movement. "The Blue Dancers" is one of the pictures of Degas, revealed to me in the soul still in youth, one of his amazing masterpieces.

Degi said: "We must have a high idea of \u200b\u200bart; It is not about what we do at the moment, but what would you like to achieve one day. Without it, you should not work. " Auguste Renoir: "Degi was inspired. Isn't it hiding behind a black forward, a hard starch collar and cylinder the most revolutionary artist in all the new painting? " Here we are not so much about the technique of painting, but about the content of the artist's creativity, about the democracy of his worldview.

Edmond Gonkur wrote about Degas: "A person is highly sensitive, capturing the very essence of things. I have not met an artist who reproduces modern life, it would be better to grab her spirit. " Someone finds Degas with an impassive observer who records only their writs in the colors, about the same women, meanwhile Berta Morizo \u200b\u200bargued that Degas "sincerely admired the human qualities of young saleswoman in the store." Pastels Degi are notable not only to the bizarre game of paints, but also the advantage of his models, self-employed by their own business, because the dances both in the considerations and the work of the work.

"Throughout your life," Paul Valeri wrote, "Dega searched in the image of a naked figure considered from all points of view, in an incredible number of poses, in all sorts of movements, the only line of lines that would express the greatest accuracy of not only this moment , but also the greatest generalization. Neither grace nor imaginary poetry is included in his goal. His works are singing nothing. In the work it is necessary to leave some place the case so that some chairs arose, exciting artist, pick up his palette and guides his hand. But a degass, a person in his essence, not satisfying never by what he gets immediately, who had too critical intelligence and too brought up the greatest masters, was never given to direct pleasure in his work. I like this severity. "

These features were inherent in the highest and serov. This is the humanism of the era, perhaps the highest takeoff of European culture.

Selection and placement of paintings by Alexander Krylov

"Aria dog" 1877 Meeting of Hemeyer, New York

"Star" 1877 Museum d "Ores, Paris

"Singer with glove" 1878

"Absinthe" 1876, Museum d "Ores, Paris

"Bathroom" 1885, Museum Hill Stid, Farmington

"Combancing woman" 1885, Hermitage, St. Petersburg

"Miss Lala in Circus Fernando" 1879, National Gallery, London

"Family Bellelli" 1858

Early period. 1854-1861

Cotton Exchange 1866-1868

Madame Valpinson with Chrysanthemums "

"Portrait of Miss Cassette" 1878

"Square of consent. Punish the carriage of the crew"

"Emmon and Teresa Morbilli"

"Tribune's tribune" 1866-1868

"Gladiller"

"Iron Wilders"

"Interior (rascated)" 1869

"Ladies' Hat Shop"

"At the modists"

"At the modists"

"On jumps"

"At the races in the Country"

"On the beach"

"On the ballet"

"Orchestra"

"Orchestra pit"

"Edmond Duranti"

"Ballerina and a woman with an umbrella" 1882

"Four dancers" 1884

"Cabaret" Ambassador "" 1876

"Toilet" 1885

"Woman in the bath" 1885

"Woman, washing back" 1886

"Woman coming out of the bath"

"Bearing woman" 1887-1890

"After bathing" 1885

"Woman, wrapped after washing"

"Woman behind the toilet"

"After washing" 1884

"Prima" 1877

"Balkerins on Bowl" 1885

"Harlequin and Colombin" 1886

"Ballet class Madame Cardinal"

"Ballet School" 1877

"Final Arabesque" 1877

"Resting dancer"

"Dancewoman with Tamburin"

"Dancers"

"Dancers on the stage. Poklons"

"Landscape with dancers"

"Dancer in Green"

"Three dancers in the rehearsal hall" 1873

"Dancers"

"Dance lesson" 1872

"Dancer at the machine" 1880

"Rehearsal on stage"

"Dancers engaged in the machine"

"Two young dancers"

"Ballet on the scene of the Paris Opera"

"Ballet scene"

"Two dancers" 1898-1899

"Little fourteen-year-old dancer"

"Repetition"

"Sitting ballerina" 1879-1880

"Three Russian dancers"

"Dancer" Hermitage

"Dancers in Pink" 1880-1885

"Ballet rehearsal"

Edgar Dega "Coast in Ebbe"

Indeed, his ability to stop the moment of life on his canvases relatives to him with this direction in painting.

His work seems to be created spontaneously, lightningless, but this is a deceptive impression. This is just a degass differed from impressionists.

2. Pelight for washing.

Edgar Degas. Wash basin. 1886 Paper, Pastel. , Paris.

One of the favorite themes of the degi is naked women taking a bath, having hair or a towel wiping.

In the picture "Taz for washing", the artist chose quite strange composite solution, cutting off the right angle painting with a table with toiletries. It seems that the spectator just entered the room where the woman washes, and looks at her from the side.

Degi himself wrote about such paintings, which just sought to create the feeling from the viewer that he browsing to the keyhole. It clearly succeeded.

3. Ballet from the opera lodge.

Edgar Degas. Opera lodge ballet. 1884 Paper, pastel. Museum of Art Philadelphia, USA.

Any other artist would show only a scene with dancers. But not degi. According to his idea, you are, the viewer, watch the ballet, and not he.

For this, he writes the picture as it were from the lodges and "in the frame" accidentally falls in the chair the viewer with a fan and binoculars. Agree, an extraordinary composite solution.

4. Miss La La in Circus Fernando.

Edgar Degas. Miss La La in Circus Fernando. 1879 Londonskaya national Gallery.

The famous acrobat is depicted at a very unusual angle. First, her figure is shifted into the upper left corner, as if the viewer, but not at all the artist looks at the artist.

Secondly, the figure is drawn from below, which greatly complicates the composition. Need to be truth large masterTo portray a person under the angle of view.

5. Absinthe.

Edgar Degas. Absinthe. 1876, Paris.

Degi was also a master in the image of the emotions of people. Perhaps one of the brightest works in this regard is the "Absinthe" picture.

Two visitor cafes are sitting closely, but so immersed in themselves, including under the action of alcohol, which is not at all noticeing each other.

For this painting posed in the studio his familiar actress and artist. It came to the point that after her writing began to whisper about their addictions to alcohol. Degi had to publicly speak out that they were not prone to this harmful habit.

The painting "Absinthe" also an unusual composition - both figures are shifted to the right. On the site I read an interesting version that I wanted to emphasize that it was not quite a sober visitor's look, which he allegedly throws on the pictures.

6. Dancer in his dressing room.

Edgar Degas. Dancer in his dressing room. 1881 Art Museum Cincinnati, Ohio, USA.

Degi, perhaps, often depicted dancers not on stage, behind their direct occupation, and in completely ordinary circumstances.

So, he has several paintings of dancers engaged in their toilet in the grimy. Together with the artist, we, as it were, we spy for the backstage life of the artist. And there is no place setting: things on the floor and the table lie in a light disorder. This slope is emphasized by negligent strokes of blue and black paint.

More about one unusual picture read the ballerinas in the article

The origin of Auguste de Ga and the Selestine Musion. He was the eldest of five children. At the age of 13, Edgar lost his mother, which was a serious blow to him. Later, in the youth, under the influence of new social ideas, Edgar changed his surname with de ga on less "aristocratic" Degas.

The Father of the artist, Auguste de Ga, managed the French branch of a large bank founded in Italy, Deant Edgar Degi, Renele Heller de Ga. Ilher de Ha emigrated to Italy during the French revolution, believing that his life is in danger. Mother Edgar, Celestina Musson, was from the French family, settled in America. Her father was a broker on a cotton stock exchange in New Orleans.

Early period

E. Degi. Sitting naked boy. 1856.

The desire to draw the beginning to manifest itself from Dega in childhood. However, his father sucks him a lawyer's career, however, Edgar did not have a lot of desire and abilities to jurisprudence, and the security of the family allowed him to engage in painting, not particularly worrying about feeding. Not needing acutely in money, Degas could afford not to sell his work and work over them again and again, striving for perfection. Degi was an obvious perfectionist who gives in his passion to perfect harmony to loss of the feeling of reality. Already at the beginning of his long creative path, Degi was an artist who, as he was joking, only by swelling the picture, it was possible to stop working on it.

Between 1874 and 1886, eight exhibitions of Impressionists took place, and Degas took part in seven of them, missing only the penultimate, in 1882. Being an outstanding draftsman, Degas knew how to portray modern life with skill, worthy of brush artists of the old days. The financial crisis, which Degi survived after the death of his father, was after several years of intense, daily work overcome, and by 1880, Degas became a noticeable and respected figure in the Paris world of art. After the final exhibition of Impressionists in 1886, the artist stopped publicly exposing his work, preferring to sell paintings written by him at a high price through several trading agents.

Dancer Degas

The extraordinary popularity of ballet scenes, captured Degas, is easily explained, since the artist shows us the world of grace and beauty, without falling into excessive sentimentality. The life of the ballet is transferred to them so brightly, which can be easily represented as far as fresh and original it seemed to these pictures of Degi contemporaries. Artists who wrote ballet to Degas or built the geometrically the right compositions, or depicted ballet stars bowed in an elegant bow. Such portraits resembled photos of Hollywood movie stars made for the cover of the glossy magazine.

"They call me a painter of dancers," wrote Degas. He really often appealed to this topic. But it is completely incorrect to think that Degas was Eotoman. "Ballerina has always been for me only a pretext to portray wonderful fabrics and grab the movement," said Degas.

An interesting entry from the "diary" Edmon de Gonkura, made on February 13, 1874: "Yesterday I spent a whole day in the workshop of an amazing artist named Degas. After many attempts, experiments, prostrates in all directions, he fell in love with everything modern, and in this modernity stopped his glance on the gratings and dancers. In essence, the choice is not so bad. All - white and pink; The female body in a batter and gas is the most charming reason for the use of light and gentle tones ... Before our eyes are the dancers ... The picture depicts a ballet foyer, where on the background of a light window, fantastic outlines of the feet of dancers, descending on the stairs, are identified; Among all these inflating white clouds, the red plaid spot is rewing, and a ridiculous figure of the balletmaster acts as a sharp contrast. And we appear graceful bends, turns and movements of these little girls in nature. The artist shows his paintings, from time to time complementing the explanations of the reproduction of some choreographic figure, imitation, speaking by the language of dancers, one of the arabesque. And truly funny see how he standing on socks, with his hands listed above his head, mixes aesthetics of dance with aesthetics of painting, arguing about the unclean tones of Velasquez and the silhouette of Manteny. "

Fragile and weightless figures of ballerinas appear in front of the viewer in the twilight of dance classes, then in the light of sofes on stage, then in short moments of rest. The apparent idleness of the composition and the uninterested position of the author create the impression of a peeled alien life ("Dance Class", 1873-1875; "Dancer on stage", 1878 - both at the Orsha Museum, Paris; "Dancers at Rehearshes", 1879, MGI, Moscow; " Blue dancers ", 1890, Orsa Museum, Paris). The same detachment is observed at Degas and in the image of nude.

Many times mentioned about the detachment of the degi in relation to his models. In fact, the image of dancers in the pictures of the degi is devoid of erotic feeling or feeling of any personal human contact. Some connoisseurs of degious creativity believe that you can see the contrast between the impassive objectivity in the drawing of characters - and warm, living feeling, spilled in the very painting. This statement may be close to objectivity where we are talking about flavoring the background, but the statement that the pictures of the degi carry in themselves and a thin, slightly sad irony of the artist, and his deep tenderness to models, similar to the emotionality of the art historian himself and cannot Be proved. In general, the sphere of feelings in painting of many artists is not expressed directly, and all the descriptions of the spectrum of emotions seem to be existing in one or another picture, only fantasies that cannot be proven nor refuted. This is their strength and weakness.

Image of cafeshnants in degious work

The most accurate certificate of cafesmans belongs to the brush of the aristocrat and the frequenter of elegant salons of Monceu Monso Edgar Dega, ahead of Toulouse-Lotter for a decade. Throughout the last third XIX. Century, before the emergence of cinema, the cafeshens remained a favorite place of rest Parishan. These institutions were very diverse and met everywhere, as in our days, cinemas: on Montmartre, Strasbourne Boulevard, on the Champs Elysees and in the suburbs. The most attractive were, of course, those that opened in the summer, in the fresh air, in gardens illuminated by white gas balls.

Degi, who did not like the open space, preferred artificial lighting, gas highlight helped him find new solutions. He said to his friends-impressionists: "You need a natural life, I am artificial." Nevertheless, the scenes from the life of kafesantanes on his canvases were responsible for the first task supplied by impressionists in front of them, to reflect modernity. Democraticity and even some vulgarity of the cafeshens attracted him. Such an atmosphere was amused and entertained Degas. There were extraordinary personalities there: the wisewriter, the eccentrics, patriot, peasants, sentimental ladies, epileptics ... The types of such a kind exist so far, and, if you think about it, any modern pop star can be counted for one of these categories. Dega had no preferences; He willingly visited both elegant places on the Champs Elysees, La Rock, Ba Ta-Clan, Elizhe Montmartre, and the dubious Kabaki Belleville and La Wist, where unusual silhouettes attracted him.

Personal life

In the personal life of Degi was simultaneously reserved and quick-tempered, which happened to him the seasons of anger, as a rule, were caused by fears to lose their independence. Small, in a round widescard, with a mockery-sad looking, not tolerant noise, despising a bustle, Degas was an aristocrat and birth, and in spirit that did not prevent him from becoming one of the most democratic artists of his time. Friends and members of his own family responded about Degas as a clumsy direct man. And indeed, once he was called "bearish" for frequent grumbling and grumbling. The degiousness of the degass to his own body was free from conventions. In fact, the bath, which we often see on its numerous late pictures of washable women, was boldly put in the middle of the workshop. He was also known as a mimic actor or clown, the poet Paul Valerie explained it by the Italian origin of the artist.

No evidence of the desire of a degass is not preserved to physical proximity to ballet dancers or any of his simulators, however, as any other information about the personal life of the artist. Nobody knew whether Dega had a mistress. Degas never talked about his relationship with women, and some researchers make out this that Degas was a voyeur, that is, he received pleasure not from sexual intercourse, but from looking at the female body. But such a conclusion also has no evidence, and cannot be recognized fair. This is just an assumption, one of the many permissible in this case. With the same success, it can be assumed that the degi should be regular intimate life with prostitutes. This is also quite a logical assumption, because these women were not interested in art and did not know who Degas. Consequently, their ignorance allowed the degass to keep his personal life in secret, which was fully consistent with his closed nature and fear of becoming a subject of passing and any ridicule. This assumption is all the more likely that Degas often spoke in his youth that he would like to become famous and unknown, that is, to get glory and money, but not suffer from the annoying attention to others. The world of prostitutes is just suitable for the role of the environment in which Degi could be unknown, but at the same time use all the benefits of his material status. However, this is also only an assumption.

Cotton Office

Upon returning to France, Dega creates " Cotton office"(1873), picture, wonderful composition, expression, light and color. This picture of Degas wrote during a trip to his relatives to New Orleans. The plot chosen to them for their web, - the business office - all artists thoroughly went around. The exact portraits of the characters are superbly inscribed to the atmosphere of the business environment, and in general the picture is a lively sketch of everyday life, it is more likely with the novels of Emil Zol, than most of the works of modern degass painters. New Orleans was at the time the fourth largest city in the United States, and as the sea port roldied with the main port of the country, New York. The basis of the prosperity of the city was a trade in cotton. Degi wrote to her friend: "One cotton. Everyone here live only by cotton and for cotton. " In the foreground, the picture is sitting uncle Degas, Michel Musion, a cotton exchange broker; Brother of the artist, Rene de Ga, depicts the reading newspaper, and his other brother, Achille de ha, leaned against the partition in the background on the left. Rene and Achill were engaged in imports of wine to New Orleans, and Degas were proud of their success. Here, in the office of uncle, they just looked for a while and therefore idle, while everyone else is busy work. Although the work makes the impression of spontaneity, its composition was thought out as carefully as on all the degiousness. For example, dressed in black figures are arranged so that it is vividly allocated in the background and as if they protrude from the picture. Later he writes a portrait of the artist Lepica ("Square of Concord") - to a certain extent a revolutionary type of portrait art, when the environment of the main (conditional) character has no less weight, value and meaning than the hero of the portrait.

"Store Study"

Works from the Montmartra sketch series were performed to order for the luxurious publication "Cardinal Family", conceived by Louis Gallevi. To this end, they were collected many etudes, lithographs, monotypes and drawings. The topic was interested in Degi, and he continued to develop it with enthusiasm, in the spirit of Rabel, which is more strange, since Alevi soon refused his plan. During the life of the degi, these work done on the ambulance hand saw only a few lucky ones, among whom was delighted with Renoir. Vollaru managed to get several drawings to use them as illustrations to the "Top Center" Maupassant and "Grimaces Kurtisanok" Pierre Louis. Only thanks to such a happy coincidence of circumstances, this little-known side of Degi's creativity has reached us. Under the pretext of the desire to leave the memory of the brother of the unrepired René de He after his death destroyed most of the drawings found by him in the workshop of Edgar.

Creative manner

Degi was little interested in the landscape, which held a central place in the work of impressionists, and he did not strive to capture the easiest light and shadow on the canvas, so fascinating Monet. Degas grew up from traditional painting, which meant so little for other impressionists. Degi can be attributed to impressionism only due to the tremble, luminous game of paints. General, both for degas and for the rest of the impressionists, was perhaps only greedy interest in the picturesque plots of modern life and the desire to capture her on the canvas with some new, unusual way. Degi himself said: "We must have a high idea of \u200b\u200bart; It is not about what we do at the moment, but what would you like to achieve one day. Without it, you should not work. " Auguste Renoir said about his friend: "Degi was angry. Isn't it hiding behind a black forward, a hard starch collar and cylinder the most revolutionary artist in all the new painting? "

The irony of fate, but in the 1890s, after the decay of the group of impressionists, the work of the degi became closest in style precisely to impressionism. However, blurred forms and bright tones, which he began to use these years, were rather a consequence of the progressive loss of vision than the artist's desire to characteristic of flashes and forms. Spontaneity was not inherent in the artist, and he himself said: "Everything I do, I learned from old masters. I myself do not know anything about inspiration, nor about spontaneity or temperament. " Special drama images are very often born from an unexpectedly bold movement of lines, an unusual composition that resembles a snap-in photo, on which the figures with the individual parts of the body are shifted diagonally into the angle, the central part of the picture is free space (Opera Orchestra, 1868- 1869, Orsha Museum, Paris; "Two dancers on stage", 1874, Gallery of the Institute of Warburg and Kurto, London; Abstenle, 1876, OBSE Museum, Paris). To create a dramatic voltage, the artist also used a directional light, depicting, for example, a person separated by the spotlight into two parts: the illuminated and shaded ("Cafehestant in" Ambassador ", 1876-1877, the Museum of Fine Arts, Lyon;" Singer with Glove ", 1878 , Fogt Museum, Cambridge). This technique subsequently used A. de Toulouse-Lotrek in billboard posses.

Its observation gift, accuracy and township view were incomparable. And he could compare the power of visual memory only with the house. Degi's observation and phenomenal visual memory allowed him to capture gestures with an extraordinary accuracy, poses, grab the characteristic movements and transmit them with extraordinary truthfulness. Degi always thoughtfully thought out the composition of his paintings, often making many sketches and etudes, and in recent years of life, when the fooling eyesight did not give him the opportunity to look for new topics, he again and again turned to his favorite images, translated sometimes contours of figures with old cave Using copy paper.

The products of the degi with their strictly verified and at the same time dynamic, often asymmetric composition, an accurate flexible pattern, unexpected angles, active interaction of the figure and space combine the seeming imperfect and the randomness of the motive and architectonics of the picture with careful thoughtfulness and calculation. "There was no art, less directly than mine," the artist himself assesses his own creativity. Each of his work is the result of long observations and stubborn, painstaking work on their implementation into an artistic image. In the work of the masters there is nothing from the expression. Completion and thoughtfulness of its compositions causes sometimes to recall the Pussen's web. But as a result, images arise on canvas that will not be an exaggeration to be called an immacitation instantaneous and random. In the French art of the 19th century, the degiousness of the degiousness in this respect is the diametrical opposite of creativity Cezann. In Cesanna, the picture carries all the immutableness of the world order and looks fully completed by the microcosm. The degas it contains only a part of a cut-off frame of a powerful stream of life. Drug images are executed by dynamism, they embody the accelerated rhythms of the modern artist of the era. It was the passion for the transmission of motion - this, according to the words identified a debit story plots: images of jumping horses, ballerinas at rehearsals, laundors and ironers at work, dressed or combing women.

Such methods suggest an accurate calculation rather than freedom and inspiration, but they also speak about the extraordinary ingenuity of the artist. In creative search for degas, it acts as one of the most bold and original artists of his time. At the beginning of the professional route, Degas proved that he could write masterfully in a traditional manner of oil on the canvas, however, in mature years, he experimentalized with various techniques or with a combination of materials. It often painted not on the canvas, but on cardboard and used different techniques, such as oil and pastel, within the same picture. The passion for the experiment was at the artist in the blood - no wonder in 1879, one of the observers who visited the exhibition of impressionists, wrote that the degi "was looking for a new technique."

The same creative was the artist's approach to engraving and sculpture. The manner of degi was influenced by different artists. He deeply read, for example, Engra, and himself ranked herself to writing in the traditional manner, which the Engr confessed. This effect is clearly visible in the early works of degasive, classic in spirit, with clearly discharged forms. Like many of his contemporaries, Degas experienced the influence of Japanese graphics with its unusual perspectives, to which he had resorted to his subsequent work. In the pictures of Dega, there are a lot of traces of unexpected for European art fragmentedness on Japanese xylographics of Kamonovo. A photograph that Degas was fond of, made a fresh and unusual composition of his canvases. Some of his works create the impression of an instant image, but in fact this feeling is the fruit of the long and painstaking work of the artist.

Edmond Gonkur wrote about Degas: "A person is highly sensitive, capturing the very essence of things. I have not met an artist who, reproducing modern life, would have grabbed her spirit. "Ultimately, Degas managed to develop his own, unique look at the impressions of the world around us. Sometimes it is called a cold, impassive observer, especially when writing female portraits, but Berta Morizo, one of the outstanding artists of that time, said that Degas "sincerely admired the human qualities of young saleswoman in the store." Not many other artists so stubbornly studied the human body as Degas. It is said that by the end of the session, the degi model was not only fatally tired of long posing, but also with painted stripes, which the artist crashes on their bodies as a markup that helped him more accurately determine the proportions.

"Throughout your life," Paul Valeri wrote, "Dega searched in the image of a naked figure considered from all points of view, in an incredible number of poses, in all sorts of movements, the only line of lines that would express the greatest accuracy of not only this moment , but also the greatest generalization. Neither grace nor imaginary poetry is included in his goal. His works are singing nothing. In the work it is necessary to leave some place the case so that some chairs arose, exciting artist, pick up his palette and guides his hand. But a degass, a person in his essence, not satisfying never by what he gets immediately, who had too critical intelligence and too brought up the greatest masters, was never given to direct pleasure in his work. I like this severity. "

Renoir once noticed that, "if Degi died fifty, he would remember him as a great artist, and nothing more. However, after fifty, his work was so expanded that he actually turned into Degas. " Perhaps, Renoir is not completely right. By the time Degas turned 30, he already created the canvas included in the treasury of world art. On the other hand, Renoir simply noticed that the mature works of the degi are more individual, they really "expanded" in style - this is distinguished by them first of all from the artist's early works. Continuing to believe in the fact that the drawing in painting is the basis of the foundations, the degi at the same time begins to take less about the beauty and clarity of the contour, expressing itself with the help of the diversity of shapes and richness of color.

Impressionism