Description
Dancers in Pink shows four dancers in pink skirts standing in a row just before going on, hands on their hips and orange-red flowers in their hair; behind them is a painted flat of dense green, and at the left two smaller figures stand on the dark stage. As a canvas painting this is a group held together by a single colour. The original is held by the Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington, Connecticut. We make it as a hand-painted oil on linen canvas, in sizes from 50 x 40 to 150 x 130 cm or to your own measurements, and you receive a photograph of the finished work for approval before dispatch.
| Title: | Dancers in Pink |
| Subject: | four dancers in pink skirts before a green stage flat, a dark stage at the left |
| Painter: | Edgar Degas (1834–1917) |
| Year painted: | about 1876 |
| Original size: | 59 cm x 74 cm |
| Original technique: | Oil on canvas |
| Painting style: | Impressionism |
| Located at: | Hill-Stead Museum, Farmington, Connecticut |
| Our reproduction: | hand-painted oil on linen canvas, 8 sizes from 50 x 40 cm to 150 x 130 cm, custom sizes on request |
Dancers in Pink – Edgar Degas
Who is shown?
Four dancers, unnamed. Degas drew in the wings for decades and almost never named his models. All four are dressed alike – a pink skirt, a bare back, orange-red flowers in the hair and on the straps – and they stand close together, turned in different directions. None of them is dancing; two rest their hands on their hips, which is the posture of waiting rather than of performing. At the left, on the darker part of the stage, two smaller figures stand further back, one of them in blue-green.
What is on the canvas?
The format is landscape and divided by a diagonal: the right two thirds are taken by the group in pink, the left third by an empty, dark stage. The skirts are painted as one broad mass of pink, lightening from the bottom upwards, in which the individual figures barely separate; only faces, shoulders and dark hair mark them off. Behind them runs a flat of dense green – painted foliage in green, olive and yellow, with no sky and no depth. The light comes from below and from the front, as from footlights: chins and throats are lit more strongly than foreheads, which is why the faces look unfamiliar. At the lower left stands the signature.
Why does this particular scene matter?
Because it shows Degas building a group out of colour rather than out of drawing. Instead of four separate figures he painted one pink surface and only then looked for the individual dancers inside it. That is a completely different procedure from the early rehearsal-room work, where every outline stayed firm. The placing is unusual too: the group is pushed to the right edge while the left third is taken by an emptiness that does nothing in the scene – and it is exactly that imbalance which gives it tension.
What does the scene mean?
Waiting in costume. The dancers are ready but not yet performing; the costume is already on, the stage is still empty. As an impressionist painting you recognise it by the way it treats light as a substance: the pink is not the colour of the cloth but the colour of the light coming through it. Impressionism for Degas almost always meant artificial light and an interior, and here that is obvious – there is no daylight in the scene at all. The work hangs well where you want a warm, soft plane of colour rather than a sharp motif, and it is wall art that reads differently from across a room than from a step away.
The motif among Degas’s works
In our range this is one of several dance scenes. Closest to it are Four Dancers, where the same idea is carried further still and in orange-green, The Dancing Class, where Degas painted the same world with the drawing still firm, and Seated Dancer Adjusting Her Shoes, where the group is reduced to one figure. If you want to see how he solved the same group idea later and in another colour, look at Yellow Dancers at the Art Institute of Chicago, while Ballet Dancers at the National Gallery in London shows where the motif ended up.
How is our hand-painted version made?
It is made with a brush and oil colours, not a printer. The hardest thing in this motif is the pink: it is not one colour but layer over layer – cooler in shadow, almost orange where the light falls on it – and if it is laid down as a single even surface the group stiffens and turns into a poster. So the painter builds the skirts in layers and finds the edges of the individual figures only at the end. The same is true of the green behind: it has to stay indefinite, or the flat becomes a real garden. Every reproduction is made afresh and no two copies are quite the same; every hand-painted copy is therefore its own. This family has no photographs of our finished canvases, because the work has not been painted since we began photographing every piece – so we show and describe none here. The photograph of your canvas reaches you before dispatch.
Which size for which wall?
If you do not know which: 90 x 80 cm. The format is landscape and the colour is soft, so the work carries larger sizes without becoming insistent. The 50 x 40 and 60 x 50 cm sizes are for a hallway or a group of smaller works; 70 x 60 cm comes closest to the size of the original, which measures 59 x 74 cm; 80 x 70 and 90 x 80 cm go above a chest of drawers or a bed and are the ones most people choose; 100 x 80 and 120 x 100 cm are the sizes above a sofa, where the work finally opens out. The 150 x 130 cm size is for a large wall, where a large painting gets air and the pink becomes a space in its own right. Measure your chosen size on the wall with a paper cut-out first. None of the sizes is held in stock as a finished item: every copy is made to order and stays a single piece.
Custom size, stretcher bar and frame
If none of the eight sizes suits your wall, we paint to your measurements and keep the proportions of the scene, so that the empty left third does not disappear and the group does not drift to the centre; that is our painting made to order. Every copy is delivered stretched on a wooden bar, ready to hang. For the frame, use our 3D application: on this motif it shows every moulding profile we carry, so you can compare gold, silver, black, white and natural wood – it is for choosing a frame and nothing else. If you want to see how the work looks on your own wall, that is our separate room-placement service.
Delivery and guarantee
Every copy is made to order in our studio in Slovenia, so allow 15 to 45 days depending on the size you choose; at the largest size the time is usually at the upper end. We send it stretched and protected for transport, framed if you chose a frame, to sixteen countries in the European Union, without customs duties. You receive a photograph of the finished work for approval before dispatch, and our returns policy applies to every order. The whole range is in the Edgar Degas gallery, and the painter’s life is described in our article about Edgar Degas.
Frequently asked questions
How many dancers are there?
Four in the foreground, in pink skirts. At the left, further back on the dark stage, two smaller figures stand.
What are they doing?
Waiting. Two rest their hands on their hips and none is dancing; the costumes are already on and the stage is still empty.
What is the green background?
A painted stage flat with foliage, not a real garden. That is why it has neither sky nor depth.
Why do the faces look unfamiliar?
Because the light comes from below, from the footlights. Chins and throats are therefore lit more strongly than foreheads.
Where is the original?
In the Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington, Connecticut. It measures 59 by 74 cm and is oil on canvas.
Why is no accession number given?
Because the record available to us does not carry one. We would rather leave the field empty than invent a number.
When was it painted?
About 1876. The record carries the year with the qualifier “about”, so we give it the same way.
Is this a print?
No. It is painted by hand in oil colours on linen; the brushstrokes are visible and can be felt.
Which size should I choose?
For a living room usually 90 x 80 cm, for a smaller wall 70 x 60 cm. The size guide is above.
Can I have a size that is not listed?
Yes, we paint to measure and keep the proportions of the scene while doing it.
Is it suitable as a gift?
Yes, especially for someone who dances or likes warm, soft colour. Because every copy is made to order, allow for the making time; if you would rather leave the choice to them, there is our gift voucher.
- Subject: four dancers in pink before a green stage flat, an empty dark stage at the left with two small figures
- Original: Edgar Degas, about 1876, oil applied to canvas, 59 x 74 cm, Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington
- Ours: hand-painted in oil, eight sizes from 50 x 40 to 150 x 130 cm, stretched and framed on request
- Worth knowing: the pink skirts are painted as a single surface – the individual dancers separate only by their faces and hair, not by their outlines
