At the Milliner's

At the Milliner's by Edgar Degas, created in 1881, is a masterwork of modern Parisian genre painting, though classified technically as a complex drawing. The piece is executed in vibrant pastel on five distinct pieces of wove paper, carefully backed with supporting paper, and ultimately laid down on a canvas support. This elaborate technique highlights Degas’s devotion to pastel as a primary medium, allowing him to achieve the rich tonality and immediacy usually associated with oil painting.

The subject captures an intimate yet highly structured moment within a Parisian milliner’s shop. Degas frequently chose to depict women engaged in contemporary, commercial activities, whether as ballet dancers or, in this case, fashionable hat makers. The composition focuses intently on the array of hats, ribbons, and textiles that were essential components of elite 19th-century women's fashion. The artist employs an unconventional perspective, typical of his later work, using dramatic cropping to emphasize the decorative complexity of the merchandise and the concentrated expression of the women examining them.

Degas utilized the rich, broken color of the pastel to create effects of light and texture on the fabric, emphasizing the sensory appeal of the luxurious goods. This powerful study of consumer culture and female commerce is a cornerstone of the Impressionist and Post-Impressionist eras. The work resides permanently in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Because of the lasting appeal of At the Milliner's, images of this profound observation of women's lives are widely distributed, and high-quality prints are frequently made available through various public domain art initiatives.