Edgar Degas

In this way I am accumulating plans which would take ten lifetimes to carry out. In six weeks time I shall drop them without regret in order to regain and never more to leave my home.

Degas was the only painter of his generation who took photography seriously

When the Franco-Prussian war began in 1870, Degas enlisted in the French National Guard artillery. It was during his service in the army that he learned he might lose his eyesight, which would have a tragic impact on his life.

they are individualised, they have character, and, above all, they are not posing, but, instead, are engrossed in the music. Before Edgar Degas, nothing like this had ever been done before

Like Manet and the Impressionists, he rejects subject and literary narrative, but in his own paintings there is always something happening

one senses an attentive observer of human psychology.

the 1850s, Degas started doing portraits and self-portraits. From the very beginning in Degas’ portraits

the musician Georges Bizet, who had not yet composed Carmen

Go on working calmly, and keep to this path”

Draw lines … Lots of lines, whether from memory or from life