Bather Sponging Her Knee

"Bather Sponging Her Knee," executed by Edgar Degas between 1878 and 1889, is a significant example of the artist’s prolific explorations into the private life of women. Classified as a drawing, this study employs a rich and complex combination of charcoal, soft pastel, and gray wash, applied deftly to off-white laid paper. Degas uses the textural contrast between the wet wash and the dry charcoal line to establish volumetric form and atmospheric shadow, rapidly capturing the intimate moment of a figure attending to her personal hygiene. The extended timeline over which Degas worked on such pieces often reflects his dedication to compositional experimentation and refinement.

Degas famously distanced himself from traditional, idealized depictions of the female nude favored by earlier academic art. Instead of classical poses, the figure in Bather Sponging Her Knee is caught in a momentary, unselfconscious action typical of his celebrated bathing series. These works offered a detached, almost voyeuristic observation of women in the domestic sphere. The focus on bathing and self-care aligns with the artist's fascination with modern subjects and everyday movement, establishing a key theme in his later output.

The piece demonstrates Degas’s shift away from pure oil painting toward the dynamism offered by drawing media like pastel, which allowed him to rapidly capture movement and atmospheric effects. This important drawing is housed in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, contributing significantly to their holdings of late 19th-century French works. Due to its age and cultural importance, high-quality images and corresponding prints of this work are frequently made available through public domain initiatives, allowing broader study and appreciation of Degas’s masterly technique in rendering the human form.