He began to paint scenes of such urban leisure activities as horse racing and, after about 1870, of café-concert singers and ballet dancers. After 1865, when the Salon accepted his history painting The Misfortunes of the City of Orléans ( Musée d'Orsay, Paris), Degas did not paint Academic subjects again, focusing his attention on scenes of modern life. 1860 National Gallery, London), done while he was still in his twenties. In 1855, Degas met Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, whose advice he never forgot: “Draw lines, young man, and still more lines, both from life and from memory, and you will become a good artist.” In April of that year, Degas was admitted to the École des Beaux-Arts.Įvidence of Degas’ classical education can be seen in his early painting, Young Spartans Exercising (ca. Degas duly enrolled at the faculty of law of the University of Paris, in November 1853, but applied little effort to his studies. Upon graduating the Lycée in 1853, at age 18, he registered as a copyist in the Louvre Museum, but his father expected him to go to law school. Degas began his schooling at age eleven, enrolling in the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, but after his mother died when he was thirteen, his father and grandfather became the main influences on him for the remainder of his youth. Edgar Degas, born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas in Paris in 1834, was the oldest of five children of Célestine Musson De Gas, a Creole from New Orleans, and Augustin De Gas, a banker.

Edgar degas complete works