User:Meganychiu/sandbox

Why in the mid-1870s was Degas attracted to the monotype? Eugenia Parry Janis, who in 1968 catalogued the mono types of Edgar Degas, believes that by 1870 Degas's use of line had developed far beyond his ability to compose. He was searching for a method of integrating line and composition. The laying out of broad tonal areas without reliance on line, which is the basis of dark field monotypes, gave Degas his chance to deal directly with the formal problems of composition. With monotypes Degas could construct forms with shadow and light-a radical departure from the explorations of other impressionists who strove to achieve the dissolution of form through light. Certainly Degas was allied with the impressionists and helped to formulate their first exhibitions. Paradoxically, however, the monotypes clearly indicate an anti-impressionism in their concern with the constructive rather than dissolvent effects of light. Moreover, in his monotypes Degas represented these effects in a black and white vocabulary, whereas the other impressionists expressed the effects of light in the language of color

Certainly Degas's interest in prostitutes, in the years 1876-1890, is characteristic of this latter interest in women. In 1876-1877 Degas filled a sketchbook, which he kept at the home of his friend Ludovic Halvy, with illustrations for Edmond de Goncourt's novel on prostitution, La Fille Eliza. He drew coarse, aging, ugly women in gauzy chemises. About the same time, and illustrating the same physical type, he began the monotypes of brothel scenes

The fifty-some brothel monotypes have been searched thoroughly for a literary source, but none has been found. Degas's interest certainly paralleled the prostitute theme of naturalist novels of the era, as evidenced in de Goncourt's book, in Huysman's Marthe, histoire d'une fille, and in Emile Zola's Nana. There is, however, a significant difference between the visual and the literary treatment of the subject. Degas's prostitutes are earthy, ugly creatures, while those of the novelists tend to be more heroic and noble

Though Degas drew individual prostitutes in a notebook, he depicted entire scenes in brothels only in monotype. In these monotypes-there are over fifty devoted to the subject the women sit or lie about, awaiting clients or entertaining them in a world defined by chandeliers, mirrors, and plush sofas. The light field or additive method is used in all these pieces. The scenes from brothels or maisons closes are the most carefully finished of the monotypes, suggesting that though no literary source can be found, they still might have had the "extra-artistic purpose" of illustrations to be published