Interpretive Resource

Uncle and Niece (Henri de Gas and His Niece Lucie de Gas), 1875-78
Hilaire Germaine Edgar Degas (1834-1917)
Oil on canvas, 39 1/4 x 47 1/4 in. (99.8 x 119.9 cm)

Discussion
Although Degas is best known for his many paintings of ballet dancers, he was deeply interested in human behavior, captured in subtle gestures and fleeting expressions. Look carefully at this painting and describe what you see. What information is conveyed about the identities, emotions, and relationship of the two people portrayed? Describe the emotional climate of this scene. What makes it seem as if you, the viewer, have interrupted these people?

Study the background. Where do you think this might be and what might the rest of the environment look like? How do the artist’s brushstrokes lend spontaneity to this otherwise somber and still picture? Look at the composition (arrangement). Although these two figures are physically placed next to each other, what visual devices has the artist used to separate them? Discuss how issues of loneliness, death, and family are addressed in this painting.

Activities
1. Degas’s sensitive portraits catch people in private, unguarded moments — as if they were not aware of his presence. Bring to class photocopies or reproductions of different types of portraits by artists from other times and places. Compare these various approaches to portraiture and how each represents the cultural values of that particular time. (Some interesting portraits to study in the Art Institute’s collection include: the Moche Portrait Vessel of a Ruler; Rembrandt’s Old Man with a Gold Chain; Philip’s Cornelius Allerton; Sharaku’s Actor Bando Mitsugoro as Ishii Genzo; Van Gogh’s Self-Portrait; Gauguin’s Ancestors of Tehamana; Beckmann’s Self-Portrait; or Hockney’s American Collectors.)

2. Uncle and Niece presents a variety of contradictions and dualities which, when explored, provide a deeper understanding of the work and the artist. Examine this painting and list as many pairs of opposites as you can find. Or explain how the following relate to this painting: male/female, old/young, intimate/distant, casual/formal, fragile/strong, together/apart, tense/relaxed, isolated/connected, natural/artificial, interrupted action/posed scene, spontaneous/controlled, outer appearance/inner psyche.

3. Although this portrait by Degas appears to be a spontaneous "slice of life,” it is a carefully composed picture. Compare this painting to "candid" photographs you may have taken or seen. By the late nineteenth century, small portable cameras were generally available to the middle-class for the first time. Explore the influence photography had on paintings created at that time, and on Degas’s work in particular.

Alternative: Sketch a traditionally posed figure in an ordinary composition, with standard lighting. Then do another drawing of a figure in an unconventional pose from an unusual viewpoint, with cropped edges and dramatic lighting. Which did you prefer to draw and why?

4. Degas created portraits of the modern city dweller — often revealing the loneliness, anxiety, and tension of modern life. Discuss these emotions and how they are still experienced by people today. Bring to class examples of these themes as expressed in the lyrics of today’s songs, art, or literature.

Alternative:Express these, or similar feelings through your own words, music, or visual images.