 Hi and welcome to Barnes Takeout. My name is Kedric Harris. I'm art team instructor here at the Barnes Foundation. Today we're going to take a close look at French artist Edgar Degas, three dancers with Heron Braids. And it's from around 1900. It hangs on the north wall of Room 8. You can see it there on the right side. With three dancers, we are presented with a subject that Degas spent the greater part of his career working and reworking. Dancers of the Paris Opera Ballet Corps. He famously had a weekly subscription to the Opera Garnier, which was the premier opera house in Paris. And later he finally managed to get access, full access to backstage the wings and the dancers dressing rooms. So something to know is that this was a world only accessible by elite wealthy men. They're therefore not accessible to women painters, for example, painters like Mary Cassatt or Bert Mojizzo. So with three dancers, we get a view of the, not only the backstage, but the more informal moments of this world of dance, the offhand moments of everyday existence. Dressing, stretching, waiting in the wings, or maybe even a little gossip. Today I'd like to dive into an important aspect of Degas visual aesthetic and that is of Japanese art. And in the mid 19th century, after about 250 years of closed trade to Europe, Japan opened its borders and art objects slowly began to make their way into France. Japan made a formal presentation of its arts to the Parisian public at the Exposition Universel, the Paris World's Fair of 1867. And that following year, when Degas was still in his 20s, a critic remarked on one of his paintings saying, quote, I am reminded of Japanese prints, end quote. And in truth, an obsession with all things Japanese emerged in Impressionist Paris. It was a phenomenon that was coined Japonisme and Japanese porcelain, lacquerware, metalworks, kimonos, and woodblock prints were in demand. They were sold in Parisian shops and in the burgeoning department stores. They were consumed by the middle class, the bourgeoisie, and Degas was one such collector of Japanese art. He bought woodblock prints and he actually worked with an important Japanese art dealer named Hayashi. He even traded some of his own works for such prints. And artists at this time were looking for alternatives from mainstream art and in Japanese art, they found a fresh perspective. It proved to be a kind of rebirth in 19th century France, one that we could perhaps like into the rediscovery of classical art from antiquity in the Italian Renaissance of the 16th century. In keeping with fashionable trends of Japanese art, many artists of 19th century Paris employed Japanese artists in their compositions, like kimonos, screens, or fans. Degas used some Japanese objects this way in his paintings. He even painted on a number of fans adapting the Japanese tradition. We might say though that Degas' relationship with Japanese art aesthetics was incredibly subtle and profound. In Degas' pictures we see parallels in subject matter with those of the Ukiyo way style of woodblock printmaking. And you see some examples of that here. Ukiyo way means sad world and is a play on the words Uki and yo, meaning floating world. And the floating world referred to the entertainment district of urban Ito or modern day Tokyo. And Ukiyo way centered on depictions of contemporary life in the world of the upper class in these entertainment areas of Ito. And that included images of actors, dancers, geishas, courtesans, or simply beautiful women. And so similarly Degas in his own work emphasized urban depictions of Paris, contemporary scenes of the world of entertainment, the Paris race tracks, the opera, the capital's brothels. We might venture to say that Degas Paris was a kind of floating world, if you will. So here we're looking at two Ukiyo way woodblock prints, and we can see this common grouping of three figures as we saw with Degas three dancers. And on the left, we can notice that there are three dancers in movement, and that we can note some strong diagonals in that picture on the left. And also this simplified space. And on the right, we see two geishas and a maid, elegant figures, kind of elongated figures. And they are also existing in a simplified space. And from left to right, we can see left kind of more limited use of color. So the printing of the black ink design first and then adding on of this limited color palette. And then on the right, we see kind of an expansion of more color added there. And so on a core level, we can say that Degas has really adapted the visual aesthetics of Japanese Ukiyo way. His emphasis here in this picture on drawing. So the black charcoal lines we see here that Degas has laid down first, and then he is adding the color. He's adding that oil pastel. And we can see the shell of those braids that are going down the dancer's backs, how the color is not quite filled in in some areas. And so we can also notice that Degas is not so much interested in modeling carefully. What I mean by that is the artist models the forms by building up color gradually to create the illusion of three dimensionality. And so he's really, Degas relying more on solid areas of color and what results is a flattening effect. And that's the same effect that we see in the Japanese woodblock prints. And we can notice the flatten effect of the stage. And we can notice, of course, Degas interested in these vibrant colors and is interested in asymmetrical compositions and strong diagonals. And here in this picture, we see the left arm of the dancer on the right forming a strong diagonal, the grabbing of her skirt, the movement of that. And then also that diagonal continues with the braid of the dancer at center. Degas' engagement with Japanese artist ethics continued throughout his career. It was an interest he shared with a generation of Impressionist artists like Monet, Morizzo, and Renoir, and post-Impressionist artists like Vincent van Gogh. If this subject intrigues you, check out the upcoming Barnes class Impressionism and Japanesema beginning the first week of June and offered online. And do subscribe to our channel and leave a comment down below. We love hearing from you. Thanks for watching. Thanks for watching and for your support of the Barnes Foundation.