Sitting Ballerina by Degas

This particularly dynamic pastel highlights Edgar Degas’s obsession with movement and the fleeting moments of rest of Parisian stage performers. Through the work temporarily named “Sitting Ballerina”, the painter offers a bold framing that breaks radically with traditional static portraits. This composition belongs fully to the Impressionist movement through its ability to capture the spontaneity of an attitude and to make the artificial light specific to the world of live performance vibrate.

A dancer or café-concert singer is depicted in the center, lying at full length on a sofa or stage bench, her body positioned diagonally. Her arms are widely extended on each side in a posture of abandonment or theatrical exuberance, revealing an expressive face with lips enhanced with red. She wears a vaporous tutu or stage dress in ochre and golden-yellow tones, fitted at the waist by a rigid black corset. In the background, a wall of a luminous azure blue contrasts beautifully with the warmth of her outfit. In the foreground, large folds of orange and blue fabrics evoke elements of scenery or a large unfolded fan.

The artist’s technical virtuosity shines brilliantly in the nervous and superimposed application of dry pastel pigments. His craftsmanship is manifested in his unique ability to translate the aerial transparency of tulles and the vibration of stage lighting. Edgar Degas breathes into this scene a truly remarkable chromatic power and physical energy.