Graphite on paper

6 3/4 x 7 3/4 inches, not including frame

13 x 14 1/2 inches, framed

Atelier Ed. Degas stamp, verso

Provenance: Originally purchased by famed San Diego photographer Lynn G. Fayman (1904-1968) from Hammer Galleries, New York. (Fayman’s archive resides at the Museum of Photographic Arts, Balboa Park, San Diego.) Thence, by descent, to his wife.

Exhibited: Fine Arts Gallery of San Diego, now San Diego Museum of Art (SDMA) "Out of Sight: From San Diego Collections", March 17 - April 23, 1972.

An early, exemplary study by the young Edward Degas. At the age of 18 Degas, having already turned a room in his home into an artist's studio, became a registered copyist in The Louvre Museum (1853). After a brief stint in law school, he decided to devote himself entirely to his art and was admitted to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. In 1856 Degas travelled to Italy where he drew and painted numerous studies of works by Renaissance masters. According to Ian Dunlop, author of "Degas" (Harper and Row, New York, 1979) contrary to conventional practice, Degas selected a detail which stood out to him, generally faces which he treated as portraits or hands shown in various displays. This work likely dates to this early period in Degas' career, 1853-1856. A similar study is currently housed in the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, Oxford, England. Please see: Whitely, Jon, Ashmolean Museum, Catalogue of the Collection of Drawings, VII, French School, 2 (Oxford University Press, 2000), 1064.