Welcome to
Lovely Dancer

5

backstage

As you have seen, Degas often depicted dancers behind the scenes preparing for their performance, stretching, tying a shoe or just chatting with their fellow ballerinas. There is something endearing and intimate about these scenes. As if the viewers is getting a glimpse into a secret world. We will be completing a Master Study of one of these pieces. We will work with our charcoal pencils first and then move onto our pastels. The goal here is to not try and perfectly recreate Degas’ masterpiece of course, but to understand a little deeper how he used color, how he used his tools and to walk in his shoes if only briefly. We will also be working on tracing paper here, something Degas did regularly. Let’s begin!

SUPPLIES NEEDED

  • Tracing paper
  • Charcoal pencil
  • Hard chalk pastels
  • Soft chalk pastels
  • Mechanical pencil
  • Hard board or something firm to attach the tracing paper to
  • Kneadable eraser
  • Spray Fixative
  • ‍Image of a Degas painting

This is drawing I chose to copy:

You don’t have to do this one. You can find more on our Pinterest board.

backstage - introduction

backstage - part 1

backstage - part 2

backstage - part 3

backstage - part 4

backstage - what we learned

Wow! This project took a lot of focus but I learned so much about how he used his pastels and his line work. His optical mixing is just amazing! I hope you all enjoy doing this study. Take your time and remember you are learning so don’t be judgemental of your work. Ok on to the next! Come on!

Let's continue to prima ballerina...