Provenance
Given by the artist to Monsieur F. Stumpf; Stumpf family until at least 1906;[1] Mme Barbier de Saint Hilaire, née Madeleine Stumpf, the child in the painting; sold by 1922[2] to (Tedesco Frères, Paris) and (Paul Rosenberg and Co., New York, London and Paris);[3] acquired c. 1965 by (E.V. Thaw & Co, New York);[4] sold January 1966 to (Thomas Agnew and Sons, London); sold 26 March 1966 to Ailsa Mellon Bruce [1901-1969], New York; bequest 1970 to NGA.
[1] Discussed as part of the Stumpf collection, but not offered for sale, in _Catalogue de tableaux moderne composant la collection de feu M. F. Stumpf_, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 7 May 1906, pp. 6-10.
[2] Letter dated 29 July 1970 from Jean Dieterle to David Rust, in NGA curatorial files.
[3] According to a letter from Alexandre Rosenberg dated 27 June 1977, in NGA curatorial files, the painting was confiscated with others from the Rosenberg collection in France in 1940, traced to a Swiss collection in 1945, and returned to the Rosenbergs in 1947. The painting is listed as no. 37.954 in the _Répertoire des biens spoliés en France durant la guerre 1939-1945_ [_List of Property Removed from France during the War, 1939-1945_, Groupe française du conseil de controle, 1947. Documents from the National Archives in Washington indicate that the picture was confiscated on 18 September 1940 from the château of Floirac (see letter dated 15 December 1944 from Edmond Rosemberg with first list of Floirac pictures, Rosenberg claim file, National Archives RG260/OMGUS/Records of the Museum, Fine Arts and Archives Section/Cultural Property Claims Applications/ Box 743, copies in NGA curatorial files). The painting was selected by Hermann Goering from the Jeu de Paume (OSS Consolidated Interrogation Report #2, The Goering Collection, 15 September 1945, Attachment 5,_Nachtrag zur Liste v. 20.10.42 der für die Sammlung des Reichnsmarschalls Hermann Göring abgegebenen Kunstgegestände_ dated 9 April 1943, no. 3, National Archives RG239/Entry 73/box 78; see also OSS dispatch dated 29 August 1945, National Archives RG 226/Entry 190/Box 532, copies in NGA curatorial files). The French dealer Zacharie Birtschansky [1889 - c.1950]was then involved in selling the picture to Hans Wendland for a Swiss dealer, probably Fischer (see OSS Consolidated Interrogation Report #2, The Goering Collection, 15 September 1945, p. 57-8, National Archives RG 226/Entry 99/Box 105, copy NGA curatorial files).
[4] Letter of 20 April 1995 from E.V. Thaw and Co., Inc., in NGA curatorial files.
Accession Number
1970.17.23
Medium
oil on canvas
Dimensions
overall: 105 x 74 cm (41 5/16 x 29 1/8 in.) | framed: 128.3 x 101.9 x 7.6 cm (50 1/2 x 40 1/8 x 3 in.)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
Ailsa Mellon Bruce Collection
Tags
Painting Impressionist & Modern (1851–1900) Oil Painting Canvas French
Background & Context
Background Story
The Ballet Scene, painted around 1890, belongs to Degas's mature and late period, when his ballet subjects had evolved from precise, carefully constructed compositions toward a more summary, color-driven style. The painting depicts a performance on stage, the dancers' tutus rendering as bright patches of color against a dark theatrical background.
By the 1890s, Degas's eyesight was failing, and his painting had become increasingly abstract. The Ballet Scene reflects this evolution: the composition is broader, the brushwork more emphatic, and the emphasis shifted from spatial complexity to chromatic intensity. The stage, seen from the wings or from a box, becomes a field of moving color, the dancers' white tutus and colored sashes creating a pattern of brilliant patches against the dark theater interior.
The painting's most modern feature is its treatment of the theatrical space. Degas eliminates the conventional framing devices - the proscenium arch, the perspective of the stage - and presents the performance as a flat field of color and movement. This flattening anticipates Matisse and the Fauves, and the painting's emphasis on decorative pattern over spatial depth looks forward to the abstraction of the early 20th century.
Cultural Impact
Degas's late ballet paintings, with their bold color and flattened space, influenced the development of abstract painting and established the theatrical performance as a subject for the most formally ambitious art. Their impact on Matisse, Bonnard, and the painters of the Ballets Russes was direct and acknowledged.
Why It Matters
The Ballet Scene captures Degas at his most modern: a painter who has stopped looking at the world and started seeing it. The stage, stripped of its theatrical illusions, is a composition of pure color and pure movement - proof that the essence of dance is not the story it tells but the visual beauty it creates.
