Sheet of Studies and Sketches
Edgar Degas (French, 1834–1917)
1858
- Medium
- graphite, pen and dark brown ink, and watercolor on thick ivory wove paper
- Classification
- Drawing
- Dimensions
- Sheet: 30.4 x 23.5 cm (11 15/16 x 9 1/4 in.)
- Culture
- France, 19th century
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Drawings
- Credit line
- John L. Severance Fund
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Teens profiles and older: its museum says too little about what it shows to place it for younger viewers. How works are placed
View at the Cleveland Museum of Art
About this work
Degas traveled to Florence, Italy, in July 1858, where he made this sheet of studies. The featured imagery is fragmented and dissociated, suggesting the young artist's engagement with art of the past. The refined female head drawn at center in graphite was copied from a drawing then attributed to Leonardo da Vinci in the Uffizi Gallery's collection. Other sketches record Degas's responses to Florentine sculpture. At upper right, he sketched an informal portrait of his cousin Giulia Bellelli, probably from life.
