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Lot Essay
“This is one of the most striking and best-known prints executed by Degas and dramatically displays the technical expertise he had acquired in the medium of lithography. It exhibits every form of natural and artificial lighting that could manifest itself in a nocturnal scene: a large gas lamppost, a cluster of gas globes, and a string of lights, seen at the right, are reflected, along with a prominent hanging chandelier, in the mirror at left behind the performer. In the dark sky, the moon shines through the trees of the Champs-Elysées, while fireworks send down streamers of light. Even a small patch of light is glimpsed in the orchestra pit. Moreover, Degas's characteristic use of reflected footlights is clearly implied in the figure of the singer, who is brightly lit from below.
Mlle Emélie Bécat, the star performer at the Café des Ambassadeurs and the Alcazar d'Eté, was permanently recorded by Degas in four lithographic images of which this is the most fully developed. Here, in the slim figure with uplifted, wide-flung arms, Degas has captured the personality of the singer. Her individualized figure remains a strong focal presence within the enveloping and contrasting patterns of the outdoor setting.
He achieved a broad tonal range that encompasses the reserved whites of the gaslights, the pale grays of the performer's dress, and the black hats in the foreground. Degas used sharp tools to scrape and scratch into the stone, to lighten crayoned areas such as the columns, or to draw the chandelier and fireworks. He attained brilliant effects by means of his proficient and varied use of lithographic techniques, both additive and subtractive.
In (Sentimental Education), in a picturesque account of a visit to a dance garden, Gustave Flaubert characterized the climax of the evening: “Squibs went off; catherine wheels began to revolve, the emerald gleam of Bengal lights illuminated the whole garden for a moment; and at the final rocket the crowd gave a great sigh.””
Sue Welsh Reed and Barbara Stern Shapiro, Edgar Degas, The Painter as Printmaker, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1984, No 31.
Mlle Emélie Bécat, the star performer at the Café des Ambassadeurs and the Alcazar d'Eté, was permanently recorded by Degas in four lithographic images of which this is the most fully developed. Here, in the slim figure with uplifted, wide-flung arms, Degas has captured the personality of the singer. Her individualized figure remains a strong focal presence within the enveloping and contrasting patterns of the outdoor setting.
He achieved a broad tonal range that encompasses the reserved whites of the gaslights, the pale grays of the performer's dress, and the black hats in the foreground. Degas used sharp tools to scrape and scratch into the stone, to lighten crayoned areas such as the columns, or to draw the chandelier and fireworks. He attained brilliant effects by means of his proficient and varied use of lithographic techniques, both additive and subtractive.
In (Sentimental Education), in a picturesque account of a visit to a dance garden, Gustave Flaubert characterized the climax of the evening: “Squibs went off; catherine wheels began to revolve, the emerald gleam of Bengal lights illuminated the whole garden for a moment; and at the final rocket the crowd gave a great sigh.””
Sue Welsh Reed and Barbara Stern Shapiro, Edgar Degas, The Painter as Printmaker, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1984, No 31.