Monotype, 21.3 x 16.4 cm.
Statens Museum for Kunst, Den Kongelige
Kobberstik, Samling Kobenhavn.
Halévy, who is today chiefly remembered as co-librettist (with Henri Meilhac) of Offenbach’s wittiest operettas, and of Bizet’s Carmen, which first introduced to the operatic stage the kind of working-class girls that fascinated Degas, achieved an enormous popular success in France between 1870 and 1880 with his stories about the Cardinal family. In Ces Demoiselles de l’Opéra, the Vieil Abonné acknowledges the truthfulness of Halévy’s portrayal of the unscrupulous mothers’ jealously guarding their daughters’ virginities only to auction them off in due course to the highest bidder.
As well as the ‘high’ art forms of opera and ballet (however debased), Degas greatly enjoyed the popular art form of the Café Concert, which reached its peak in the 1870s. In works toward the end of that decade such as In the "Café des Ambassadeurs" (p. 47) and The Song of the Dog (p. 48) (both executed in pastel on top of a monotype print), Degas vividly captures the animated gas-lit atmosphere of the Café Concerts, with the gaudily dressed prostitutes weaving their way through the crowds in search of customers.
According to The Pretty Women of Paris, not only did prostitutes find the floors of the Café Concerts rich hunting-grounds, but many took to the stage in order to increase their connections and display their charms. Perrine, for example, ‘graces the music-hall stage with her presence, but only for the purposes of prostitution, for she has but a piping, shrill little voice.’ The Song of the Dog shows the most famous Café Concert star of the time, Thérésa.
Degas enthused about her. ‘She opens her mouth and out comes the largest and yet the most delicate, the most wittily tender voice there is.’ Earning a reputed 30,000 francs a year and the owner of a magnificent house at Asnières, Thérésa had no financial need for prostitution but, in the words of The Pretty Women of Paris, ‘Thérésa is occasionally sought after by rich strangers, who spend a few hours with her out of curiosity.’ We are also informed that ‘the curse of her life has been her voracious appetite for active tribadism’ and that ‘If the rakes who seek the enjoyment of her body bring a fresh-looking girl with them as a sacrifice to the insatiable Sappho, they will not be asked for a fee...’
In the 1880s, Degas began the splendid series of Toilettes - women washing and drying themselves and combing their hair - which constitute one of his greatest achievements. These Toilettes mark a significant break with the post-Renaissance tradition of depicting the female nude as a glorified pin-up self-consciously displaying her charms for the benefit of the male viewer.