The Bathers

This pastel marks one of Degas's most ambitious projects during the last decade of his life. Evoking four bathers each at distinct points in the bathing process, this vision was created by suspending layers of pastel in fixative on translucent tracing paper, which the artist pieced together and mounted. Like many of his best works, this ephemeral creation was discovered in Degas's studio at the time of his death, perhaps deliberately unfinished.