Degas’ racy “Waiting for the Client,” circa 1877, was inspired by scenes from a Parisian brothel.Courtesy of the MoMAWe’ve all seen Edgar Degas’ dancers — but what about his laundresses, prostitutes and madams?
A new side of the 19th-century artist is explored in MoMA’s “Edgar Degas: A Strange New Beauty.” Opening Saturday, the show — its subtitle lifted from Degas’ pal, poet Stéphane Mallarmé — homes in on a period in the artist’s life, beginning in the mid-1870s, when he was consumed with making monotypes: Drawing in black ink on a metal plate to make a single print on white paper let the Frenchman explore more than 50 shades of gray.
But the 180 or so works here, pulled from collections public and private from around the world, are hardly black and white. In fact, Degas — a workaholic and, in later years, curmudgeon and anti-Semite — started with ink but then went beyond it, adding pastels, watercolors, charcoal and even his fingerprints to get the effects he wanted.
“We hope you’ll see an adventurer,” says curator Jodi Hauptman, “an artist covered up to his elbows in ink . . . and he just tries everything!”
Degas certainly tried to capture everything, landscapes included — and there are some beautiful ones here, of rivers, fields, even Mount Vesuvius. Mostly, however, he tried to express motion and the different effects of light, both artificial and gas, in his native Paris, the City of Light. He painted people in the streets, their faces blurred with movement; in cafes, theaters and, as it turn out, brothels.
There’s a wall of works set in the later, some never exhibited during Degas’ lifetime. But while poor Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s deformity drove him to the ladies of the night for comfort as well as content, we don’t know whether Degas frequented brothels beyond finding something new to depict. Detached, he observes prostitutes — naked except for the occasional red or blue knee sock — along with their top-hatted customers, who often linger at the edge of the frame, sizing them up. His women never look at us as they recline or bathe or present flowers to their madam on her name day.
In a way, they’re working as hard and joylessly as that laundress.
“Edgar Degas: A Strange New Beauty” runs through July 24 at MoMA, 11 W. 53rd St.; moma.org
