The Rehearsal Onstage

Description

The Rehearsal Onstage by Edgar Degas looks into a theatrical space where dancers practice, stretch, and pause. A seated dancer fills the foreground, her pale skirt spreading across the picture and her pink slipper extending into the open floor.

Behind her, a musician raises his bow as other dancers stand before dark stage scenery. Two seated men at the right provide a still counterpoint to the active group. The slanting floor and uneven clusters of figures lend The Rehearsal Onstage the immediacy of a scene glimpsed from the wings.