This autumn, the Royal Academy of Arts stages a new exhibition focusing on Edgar Degas’s preoccupation with movement as an artist of dance and ballet subjects. ‘Degas and the Ballet: Picturing Movement’ traces the development of the artist's ballet imagery throughout his career, from the documentary mode of the early 1870s to the sensuous expressiveness of his final years.
This is the first time an exhibition attempts to present Degas’s progressive engagement with the figure in movement in the context of parallel advances in photography and early film. The painter was keenly aware of these technological developments and often directly involved with them.
This is certainly an opportunity to interest new audiences for ballet and dance – Opus Arte offers a rich catalogue of ballet productions from Tchaikovsky classics to influential new work by choreographers like Christopher Wheeldon and Wayne McGregor. Also available is a collection of music from Degas’s times.
‘Degas and the Ballet: Picturing Movement’ will run from 17 September until 11 December 2011 at the Royal Academy in London.
http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibitions/degas/
http://www.opusarte.com/en/degas-music-of-his-time-griffith-9bf6.html
http://www.opusarte.com/en/art-and-music-degas-music-of-his-time-d59e.html