Degas Drawings

Degas' studies of dancers—in practice, on stage, and at relax—began in the 1870s and intensified during the consequent decades. This stage also marked the beginning of his success as an artist. One of Degas' principal concerns as a draftsman was analyzing the movements and gestures of the female body. Though noted for his attention to the female figure, Degas executed many studies of grouped horses and jockeys from which he would use figures in later compositions. Later in his career, Degas experimented with mixing drawing media and printmaking techniques. After the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71, Degas focused almost exclusively on dancers and nudes, increasingly turning to sculpture as his eyesight weakened. In his later years, he was concerned chiefly with showing women bathing, entirely without self-consciousness and emphatically not posed.