The Bathers

Prints and Drawings

1885/95

Edgar Degas
French, 1834-1917

This pastel marks one of Degas’s most ambitious projects during the last decade of his life. Evoking four bathers each at distinct points in the bathing process, this vision was created by suspending layers of pastel in fixative on translucent tracing paper, which the artist pieced together and mounted. Like many of his best works, this ephemeral creation was discovered in Degas’s studio at the time of his death, perhaps deliberately unfinished.

Status: Currently Off View
Department: Prints and Drawings

Artist: Hilaire Germain Edgar Degas
Title: The Bathers
Place: France (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1885–1895
Medium: Pastel and charcoal on tan wove paper
Inscriptions: Signed: "Degas"
Dimensions: 113.4 × 115.7 cm (44 11/16 × 45 9/16 in.)
Credit Line: Gift of Nathan Cummings
Reference Number: 1955.495
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/83644/manifest.json

P. A. Lemoisne, Degas et son Oeuvre 3 (Paris, 1946), no. 1079 (ill.).
Daniel Catton Rich, “Bathers by Edgar Degas,” The Art Institute of Chicago Quarterly 49:4 (November 15, 1955), pp. 68-70 (ill.).
Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Picture Collection (Chicago, 1961), p. 121.
John Maxon, The Art Institute of Chicago (New York, 1970), pp. 268 and 280 (ill.).
Fiorella Minervino and Franco Russoli, L’Opera completa di Degas (Milan, 1970), no. 1003 (ill.).
Sandra Grung, Supplement to Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Picture Collection (Chicago, 1971), p. 122d.
Harold Joachim and Sandra Haller Olsen, French Drawings and Sketchbooks of the Nineteenth Century 2 (Chicago, 1979), p. 45, no. 2G8.
J. Patrice Marandel, The Art Institute of Chicago: Favorite Impressionist Paintings (New York, 1979), p. 38 (ill.).
Degas, exh. cat. (Paris, 1988), p. 556, fig. 312.
Jean Sutherland Boggs, Degas (Chicago, 1996), pp. 62-65, 104 (ill.), and 111, pl. 33.
“A great artist’s advice: do not miss this Degas,” The Independent (May 22, 1996), p. 10.
Diane Kelder, The Great Book of French Impressionism (New York, 1997).

Paris, Galerie Vollard, “Degas,” 1936.
Washington, D.C., The National Gallery of Art, “Selections from the Nathan Cummings Collection,” June 28-September 11, 1970, pp. 22-23, cat. 10 (ill.); traveled to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, July 1-September 7, 1971.
The Art Institute of Chicago, “Major Works From the Collection of Nathan Cummings,” October 20-December 9, 1973, pp. 16-17, cat. 8 (ill.).
The Art Institute of Chicago, “Degas in The Art Institute of Chicago,” July 19-September 23, 1984, pp. 188-191, cat. 91 (ill.), cat. by Richard R. Brettell and Suzanne Folds McCullagh.
London, England, The National Gallery, “Degas: Beyond Impressionism,” May 22-August 26, 1996, pp. 85, 146, 276, 278-279 (ill.), and 304, cat. 88, cat. by Richard Kendall; traveled to The Art Institute of Chicago, September 28, 1996-January 5, 1997.
The Art Institute of Chicago, “The Broad Spectrum: Color on Paper, Past and Present,” September 12–October 31, 1999, hors. cat.
The Art Institute of Chicago, May 15, 1997-March 27, 2000.
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, “Degas and the Nude”, October 9, 2011 - February 5, 2012, pp. 66, 210 ,211, fig. 235, cat. by George T. M. Shackelford, Xavier Rey, et.al.
Williamstown, MA, Sterling and Francine Clark Art Instititute, “Renoir: The Body, The Senses”, June 7 - September 19, 2019. Traveled to Fort Worth TX, The Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, October 27, 2019 - January 26, 2020, fig. 82a, cat. 44 (ill.), pp. 92, 98, 197, cat. by Esther Bell and George T. M. Shackelford.

Estate of the artist [stamp, Lugt 658, lower left in red]; sold, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, May 4-5, 1918, First Degas estate sale, lot 211 (ill), to Ambroise Vollard (1867-1939), Paris [Rich 1955]; Ambroise Vollard, until at least 1936 [Paris 1936]. Given by Nathan Cummings, Chicago, to the Art Institute, 1955.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.