
Public collection via the Art Institute of Chicago
AT-00002269Three Studies of a Dancer in Fourth Position
by Edgar Degas
Inscriptions
Signed recto, lower left, in black pastel: "Degas"
Provenance
Roger Marx (1859-1913), Paris [Paris 1988]; sold, Galerie Manzi-Joyant, Paris, May 11-12, 1914, Marx sale, lot 124, to Durand-Ruel, Paris, for 10,070 francs [Paris 1988]; sold to Tewes (or Trewes) [Durand-Ruel archives]. Adele Rosenwald Levy (1892-1960), New York; bequeathed to the Art Instituteof Chicago, 1962.
Exhibition history
New York, Museum of Modern Art, "The Mrs. Adele R. Levy Collection: A Memorial Exhibition," June 9-July 16, 1961, p. 14 (ill.). Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland, "Degas," August 13-September 30, 1979, cat. 74 (ill.). The Art Institute of Chicago, "Degas in The Art Institute of Chicago," July 19-September 23, 1984, pp. 96-97, cat. 42 (ill.), by Richard Brettell and Suzanne Folds McCullagh. Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art, "Degas: The Dancers," November 22, 1984-March 10, 1985, pp. 71 and 136, cat. 20 (ill.), cat. by Ted Shackelford. Paris, Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, "Degas," February 9-May 16, 1988, cat. 224; also traveled to Ottawa, the National Gallery of Canada June 16-August 28, 1988; and New York, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, September 27, 1988-January 8, 1989. The Art Institute of Chicago, September, 1996-January, 1997. Omaha, Neb., Joslyn Art Museum, "Degas and the Little Dancer," February 7-May 3, 1998, cat. 14, by Richard Kendall; also traveled to Williamstown, Mass., Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, May 30-September 8, 1998; and the Baltimore Museum of Art, October 4, 1998-January 3, 1999. London, Royal Academy of Arts, "Degas and the Ballet, Picturing Movement", September 17 - December 11, 2011, pp. 78-79,82-23, cat. 23, cat. by Richard Kendall and Jill Devonyar. The Art Institute of Chicago, "Degas: At the Track, On the Stage", July 1, 2015-February 26, 2016, no cat.
Publications
Roger Marx, 1897, pp. 321 and 323 (ill.). G. Bazin, L’Amour de l’Art (July 1931), p. 294 (ill.). Georges Grappe, Degas (1936), p. 35 (ill.). Camille Mauclair, Degas (Paris, 1937), p. 167, no. 150 (ill.). Ernst Rouart, Le Point (February 1937), p. 17 (ill.). John Rewald, Degas: Works in Sculpture, A Complete Catalogue (New York, 1944), pp. 21, and 62 (ill.). Paul A. Lemoisne, Degas et son Oeuvre, 1 (Paris, 1946), pp. 330-331, no. 586 (ill.). Lillian Browse, Degas Dancers (Boston, 1949), p. 368, no. 91 (ill.). Harold Joachim and Sandra Haller Olsen, French Drawings and Sketchbooks of the Nineteenth Century 2 (Chicago, 1979), p. 40, no. 2F2. George T. M. Shackelford, Degas, the dancers (Washington D. C., 1984), pp. 136, no. 20 Richard Brettell, French Impressionists (Chicago, 1987), pp. 52-53, and 117 (ill.). Galeries Nationale du Grand Palais, Degas (Paris 1988), pp. 347-348, no. 224. The Chicago Tribune (August 12, 1990), section 13, p. 15 (ill.). Jean Sutherland Boggs, Degas (Chicago, 1996), pp. 45, 43 (ill. detail), 91 (ill.), and 109, pl. 20. Writing and Grammar: Timeless Voices, Timeless Themes (2001). Les Cahiers Ateliers-Degas (Fall 1996). Maryann Cocca-Leffler, True Kelly, and Joan Holub, Edgar Degas: Paintings That Dance (New York, 2001). American Federation of Art, Edgar Degas: The Painter of Dancers (2002).
Data retrieved from the Art Institute of Chicago on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Edgar Degas / French, 1834-1917
- Date
- 1879/80
- Medium
- Charcoal and pastel with stumping, and touches of brush and black wash, on grayish-tan laid paper with blue fibers, laid down on gray wove paper
- Dimensions
- 48 × 61.6 cm (18 15/16 × 24 5/16 in.)
- Type
- Drawing
- Classification
- pastel
- Place
- France
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Credit line
- Bequest of Adele R. Levy
- Accession no.
- 1962.703
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