User:Julkubi/sandbox

= The Ballet Class = [[File:Edgar_Degas_-_La_Classe_de_danse.jpg|thumb|Title              The Ballet Class

Author          Edgar Degas

Year              1874

Genre           impressionism         Medium         oil on canvas

Dimensions height  83.5

width  77.2 cm]] The Ballet Class (French: La Classe de danse) is a painting by Edgar Degas, currently in the collection of Musée d'Orsay. The painting was commissioned in 1873 by Jean-Baptiste Faure, and was finished in 1874. Faure was later also the one to lend it to the 1876 Impressionist exhibition. The painting presents two dozen or so ballerinas after training with Jules Perrot at the Paris Opera house. Ballerinas at work were one of Degas’ favourite subjects and he focused on backstage training, observing especially closely the spontaneous ordinary gestures and movements of the body at rest.

Background
Degas was an impressionist painter who focused primarily on figure painting, rather than landscapes, so he worked mostly in his studio. This is unlike most other impressionist painters, who wanted to achieve the optical impression of the transitory elements of the world, and therefore preferred plen-air painting. His use of innovative viewpoints was what introduced the apparent spontaneity in his paintings. From the 1870s on, his main topic of interest were ballerinas, especially backstage. Thanks to his friend, the dancer and choreagrapher Jules Perrot, Degas was able to see the ballerinas during rehearsals and paint them in relaxed poses.

== Other famous painting by Degas ==


 * The Ballet Rehearsal (1875) Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City.
 * Dancer with a Bouquet, Bowing (1877) Musee d'Orsay.
 * Two Dancers on Stage (1877) Courtauld Gallery, London.
 * The Green Dancers (1879) Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid.
 * Dancers in Blue (1895) Musee d'Orsay.