Ballet— with its sprained ankles, sore muscles, broken toes and swelling anxiety— has never been a dance of leisure. It is a dance choreographed with arching backs, swan-necks, and stretched appendages propping elegant forms towards the sky; an effort of endurance as much as one of elegance. This effort held captive the breaths of the Paris Opéra’s patrons in 1874, where we find a 39-year old Edgar Degas, bewitched with the dramatic movement’s undeniable humanness.
Degas was unconcerned with ballet for its beauty or history, the artist was far from an enthusiastic balletomane. Degas' interest was in Parisian rehearsal studios, audition rooms- everything up until the stage. It was the ballerina’s grueling experience of physical martyrdom that provided Degas with inspiration that would follow him through the end of his career. In ballet, Degas found what he saw in himself; obsession, fortitude, and a capacity for pain, all in the name of passion.
Observing movement
In The Toledo Museum of Art’s upcoming exhibition, Degas and the Dance, the selected works portray Degas’ relationship to the dancer’s movement, with iconic sculptures and paintings. In addition to several paintings of dancers depicted in backstage classrooms, six sculptures will be on display. Most notably, the Little Dancer of Fourteen Years a premier example of the artist’s fascination with the demands of dance. The face of the young student is contorted and pained, with the sculpture’s original wax cast including real hair— a shocking addition that disgusted critics upon its 1881 premier.
For Degas, the ballerina represented a sumptuous subject with an appetite for the pains of human experience. In his works, Degas does not portray ballet as a sport of fragility, but one that requires vitality in expression. He honored the rehearsal studio, but rarely the stage, finding the diversity and difficulty of movement an inspiring challenge. Degas drew quickly, and the dancers moved quicker— the movement a pretext for his preoccupation with form and texture.
Honoring history
Degas and the Dance, celebrates The Toledo Museum of Art’s concurrent relationship with Degas’ body of work and the Toledo Ballet. A large supporter of the Toledo Ballet, the TMA’s showing of Degas’ ballerinas follows with the museum's catalogue, which began in 1928 with the acquisition a pastel of ballerinas.
“This very special exhibition provides the Museum with the wonderful opportunity to showcase some of the most beloved dance imagery ever created and in the process to underscore the important heritage of Degas at the Museum and the rich legacy of 75 years of the ‘Nutcracker’ in Toledo,” said Lawrence W. Nichols, TMA's William Hutton Senior Curator of European and American Painting and Sculpture before 1900.
In addition to the exhibition, the TMA will install a dance studio, complete with a ballet barre, dance floor and mirrors, in an adjacent gallery. Students from the Toledo Ballet hold open rehearsals (6:45-8:30pm, November 6 and 20) giving life to the world that Degas’ depicted. Studio dancers will serve as models in free drawing classes on November 19 and 27. Archival materials and costumes from the Toledo Ballet’s decades of The Nutcracker productions will also be on display in the exhibit.
Lecture:
Lawrence Nichols–
The exhibition’s curator will discuss and tour Degas and the Dance .
2pm, Saturday, October 17. Little Theater
Toledo Ballet Founder Marie Vogt in Conversation with Museum Director Brian Kennedy –
Explore the Toledo Ballet’s rich relationship with the TMA.
11am, Saturday, November 7. Libbey Court.
Halona Norton-
Westbrook discusses and screens Miss Expanding Universe: Isamu Noguchi’s Designs for Dance with the film “Appalachian Spring” – Discover the American artist Isamu Noguchi’s working history with the 20th century’s greatest choreographers and composers.
2pm, Saturday, November 14. Little Theatre
What Did the Ballerina Hear? The Unheard Music of Degas’s Paintings with Eftychia Papanikolaou –
Associate professor of musicology at Bowling Green State University, suggests a soundtrack for Degas’ dance works, featuring live musical accompaniment.
2pm, Saturday, November 21
Book & Film:
“The Dying Swan” –
A visually striking 1916 silent film by Russian filmmaker Evgeni Bauer.
2pm, Sunday, October 18. Little Theater
“Tales of Hoffman” –
Stories of immigration are related through the joy of dance.
2pm, Saturday, October 24. Little Theater
“An American in Paris” –
‘50s screen stars sing and dance in Technicolor.
2pm, Saturday, November 7. Little Theater
Art Book Club:
“The Painted Girls” Imagine the life of the girl behind Degas’ famous sculpture, Little Dancer Aged Fourteen.
Discussion: 5:30pm, Tuesday, November 17, Tour: 5:30pm, Thursday, November 19
Dance:
75th Annual Nutcracker –
The Toledo Ballet joins the Toledo Symphony Orchestra at the Stranahan Theater.
December 12-14.
Awkward Girl:
A Journey through Degas A performance in partnership with the Toledo Ballet at the Peristyle.
January 3, 2016
October 15 through January 10, 2016
The Toledo Museum of Art, 2445 Monroe St.
419-254-5000 | toledomuseum.org
Free
