"Edgar Degas is best known for his vivid studies of dancers. He captured them warming up, practising at the bar or mid-performance with a stunning immediacy and accuracy, on canvas, paper and in bronze. Illustrated with drawings, pastels, paintings, prints and sculpture, this beautiful book proposes that Degas's ballet imagery is more than simply an expression of his lifelong engagement with the figure in movement. Exploring the artist's innovative approach to his subject matter in the context of contemporary developments in photography and film, Degas scholars and exhibition co-curators Richard Kendall and Jill DeVonyar bring together photographs taken by the artist and his contemporaries and samples of film from the period. This study establishes the importance of early visual technologies to the practice of Degas's work for the first time."--Publisher's website.