# The Dance Class [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [DEGAS, Edgar]() - Date: 1851-1900 - Technique: Oil on canvas, 88 x 75 cm ## Commentary From 1870 Degas increasingly painted ballet subjects. In these paintings he explored the subject's potential through variations on the theme. In The Dance Class he has grouped some twenty girls and one or two mothers too, watching or comforting their daughters. Dominating the scene \(and painted in as an afterthought\) is instructor Jules Perrot, with the huge stick he used to beat out a rhythm. This trial session under the famed teacher is taking place in the rehearsal rooms of the old opera house in Rue Peletier, which has long since burned down. ## Related artworks - [A Ballet Dancer in Position]() - [Absinthe Drinkers]() - [After the Bath]() - [After the Bath. Woman Drying Herself]() - [At the Beach]() - [At the Café des Ambassadeurs]() - [At the Milliner's]() - [At the Milliner's]() - [At the Mirror]() - [At the Races in the Countryside]() - [Aux Ambassadeurs: Mademoiselle Bécat]() - [Ballerina with a Bouquet, Curtsying]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()