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Updated: May 31, 2025
All three were intolerant of reputations as such, but were strong for individual merit whether it carried a great name or not. They were constantly becoming acquainted with the work of some genius little known here, and celebrating his talents, each to the others. Thus Monet, Degas, Manet, Ribera, Monticelli, by turns came up for examination and praise.
He is a man who has loved his art like a mistress, with jealous passion, and has sacrificed to it all that other artists enthusiasts even are accustomed to reserve for their personal interest. Degas, the incomparable pastellist, the faultless draughtsman, the bitter, satirical, pessimistic genius, is an isolated phenomenon in his period, a grand creator, unattached to his time.
"Manet is in despair because he cannot paint atrocious pictures like Durant, and be fêted and decorated; he is an artist, not by inclination, but by force. He is as a galley slave chained to the oar," says Degas. Different too are their methods of work. Manet paints his whole picture from nature, trusting his instinct to lead him aright through the devious labyrinth of selection.
He is neither lyrical, nor voluptuous; his energy is cold; his wise spirit affirms soberly the true character of a face or an object. Since a long time this spirit has moved Degas to revel in the observation of contemporary life. His nature has been that of a patient psychologist, a minute analyst, and also of a bitter ironist. The man is very little known.
They paint their environment the only true historic method and they do this with a modern technique. Manet, Goya, Renoir, Monet, Pissarro, Toulouse-Lautrec, Degas, Whistler, and others may be noted in the technical schemes of nine out of ten native-born American artists. The question at issue is whether our new men have anything to say, and do they say it in a personal manner.
Manet is an incomplete Velasquez; but he is a great colourist, and interpreted in his fluid, nervous manner the "modern" spirit. Degas, master designer, whose line is as mighty as Ingres his master, is by courtesy associated with the Impressionistic group, though his methods and theirs are poles asunder.
Almost everything in Mr. Whistler already existed in art. In the National Gallery the white stocking in the Philip reminds us of the white stockings in the portrait of Miss Alexander. In the British Museum we find the shadows that he transferred from Rembrandt to his own etchings. Degas took his drawing from Ingres and his colour that lovely brown! from Poussin.
Raffaelli went there and so did Renoir; but the former was impartially impressionistic; the latter, ever ravished by a stray shaft of sunshine flecking the faces of the dancers, set it all down in charming tints. Not so Toulouse-Lautrec. Combined with a chronic pessimism, he exhibited a divination of character that, if he had lived and worked hard, might have placed him not far below Degas.
I should seek it if I bought pictures. If Degas were to tell me that a picture I had intended to buy was not a good one I should not buy it, and if Degas were to praise a picture in which I could see no merit I should buy it and look at it until I did.
Such confession will make me appear weak-minded to many; but this is so, because much instruction is necessary even to understand how infinitely more Degas knows than any one else can possibly know. The art patron never can understand as much about art as the artist, but he can learn a good deal. It is fifteen years since I went to Degas's studio for the first time.
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