The Rehearsal

In a bare rehearsal room ballet dancers stretch and practice, a violinist seated at the side, while a spiral staircase slices across the upper left and dancers are cropped abruptly by the frame's edge. Degas, the great painter of the ballet, composes the scene with off-center, candid daring borrowed from photography and Japanese prints, catching the unglamorous labor behind the spectacle. Now in the Frick, the Rehearsal shows his fascination not with the performance but with the practice - tired bodies, awkward poses, and the cool grey light of the working studio.