Edgar Degas - The Star 1878 Tile

The Star / Dancer on Stage (L'Étoile / Danseuse en scène), made around 1876-1878 in pastel over an ink monotype on laid paper by French Impressionist painter Edgar Degas. A solo ballerina is seen from a steep angle as she performs under stage lighting, with the surrounding space simplified so that her pose dominates the sheet. Degas printed the underlying image from an inked plate and then added pastel, a hybrid process that gave him both the dark tonal structure of printmaking and the direct colour of drawing. Because a monotype normally yields only one strong impression, each printed base was essentially unique before he began adding colour. The result turns a brief theatrical gesture into an image that is simultaneously precise in pose and unusually experimental in technique.