Mar 10, 2022 - Sale 2597

Sale 2597 - Lot 58

Price Realized: $ 3,500
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 4,000 - $ 6,000
EDGAR DEGAS
Danseuse sur scène, saluant.

Soft-ground etching and aquatint printed in dark brownish black on cream laid paper, 1891-92. 6 5/8x5 1/8 inches, full margins. Third state (of 3), with the shading on the left side of the dancer's dress burnished. Edition of approximately only 25 (there is also an edition of approximately 25 on Japan paper). A superb, richly-inked impression of this extremely scarce etching.

This etching appeared in the deluxe edition of Georges Lecomte's 1892 L'Art impressionniste d'après la collection privée de M. Durand-Ruel, with works reproduced from the collection of the famed Parisian dealer and champion of Impressionism Paul Durand-Ruel. The artist A. M. Lauzet made many of the etchings after the paintings in Durand-Ruel's collection for the book. According to Reed and Shapiro, "Degas was dissatisfied with Lauzet's prints and made two of his own. Apparently, he did not complete the project, for two other prints by Lauzet that reproduce Degas's paintings, Avant la course and Ballet de Don Juan, were included in the book." Lauzet's renditions of the other two Degas (1834-1917) subjects, Chevaux dans le pré and Danseuse sur scène, saluant, which are known in proof impressions, are conventional and in the same-direction as their prototypes, whereas Degas's etchings of these two subjects are worked more loosely and in reverse of his own paintings (which indicates that he produced them on the etching plates freehanded with his paintings as a guide). Adhémar 58; Reed and Shapiro 57.