Degas at the Races: Paintings and Drawings
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Studio Interior with "The Steeplechase," c. 1881, oil on canvas mounted on board, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Sam Spiegel Collection
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This is an unusual image: a document that the artist created of a moment in time. It shows the original painting of Scene from the Steeplechase: The Fallen Jockey as it appeared in 1866, as if displayed in the artists' own studio. For a long time, this painting was thought to be a study for Scene from the Steeplechase. Recently, the real subject of the picture was deciphered.
It's a very difficult painting to read. First you see, slightly off center, the image of a steeplechase. Then you begin to notice other things: in the upper right-hand corner is a block of white, probably another painting. At the lower right is another rectangle, yet another painting, and right next to it, overlapping the white rectangle, is an area of blue that looks as if it might be a figure, as if there were a spectator in the studio looking at the paintings.
Degas produced a number of paintings in which the act of looking and the role of the spectator are explored. Degas himself was an avid collector, not only of his own art, but also of works by other artists, including Ingres, Delacroix, and Goya. Degas spoke about creating his own museum, prompting speculation as to whether he would include his own works. It has been suggested that this picture might have been Degas' "mock up" of how Scene from the Steeplechase might appear in his private museum. So here once again, Degas provides the viewer a glimpse of life through the keyhole, a peek into his own studio.
This painting is also an important document for Scene from the Steeplechase, because it shows its appearance before Degas reworked it. Scientific studies--X-ray and infrared photographs-- have confirmed that this is how the painting looks underneath the surface. Study it carefully, and you will see the horse with the little tail sticking up in the air that we noticed in the final reworked picture. If you recall the undefined brown area at the right of the final painting, you can see that it was once a horse, with even a bit of a saddle. Notice, too, that the horse is much farther away from the fallen jockey than the one in the later version. This picture also lacks the trees of the other painting, and the sky is predominantly blue--bright pink is not present in this first version. This image was never meant for public viewing, but was, perhaps, a private document to remind Degas of what Scene from the Steeplechase looked like before he retouched it.
Degas suffered from increasingly poor eyesight as he became older. Fundamentally interested in the basic formal qualities of art--line, shape, or color--his work became more abstract as he aged. Degas was more interested in interactions of color and form than in details. His weakening eyesight and inability to see fine details may have played a role, but perhaps it was a conscious move away from depictions of reality toward more aesthetic and increasingly abstract works.