Fr : version française / En: english version

Powerful and immaterial

Powerful and immaterial

On earth as it is in heaven

On earth as it is in heaven

Taming fire

Taming fire

Quest for Fire

Quest for Fire

The raw and the cooked

The raw and the cooked

Roasting, frying, grilling, boiling and braising

Roasting, frying, grilling, boiling and braising

Household arts

Household arts

It's Winter, light the fire!

It's Winter, light the fire!

Heating the artist's workshop

Heating the artist's workshop

Adding fuel to the fire

Adding fuel to the fire

From earthenware jug to fridge

From earthenware jug to fridge

Alchemy

Alchemy

Vulcan's forges

Vulcan's forges

Magic of transparency

Magic of transparency

The Candelabra's luster

The Candelabra's luster

The electricity fairy

The electricity fairy

City lights

City lights

The steam horse

The steam horse

Boom!

Boom!

3, 2, 1...blastoff!

3, 2, 1...blastoff!

Fear in the city

Fear in the city

Caught in the cross fire

Caught in the cross fire

Auto-da-fé

Auto-da-fé

Show me a sign

Show me a sign

Witches and the stake

Witches and the stake

Up in smoke

Up in smoke

Saint John's bonfires

Saint John's bonfires

Like a great sun

Like a great sun

One last bouquet

One last bouquet

The electricity fairy

Impressionists are said to be painters of light. Degas preferred his artificial, playing with the reflections of mirrors. He painted this picture the exact same year electric lights were invented. If Degas had not gone blind, how would he have handled that ingenious invention?

La Marseillaise électrique

Chant de guerre des électriciens

Allons, enfants de la batt'rie l
Le jour de voir est arrivé !
Contre nous, du gaz qu'on décrie,
Trop longtemps, le bec fut levé ! (bis)
Entendez-vous nos fils, nos compagnes,
Gémir parce qu'on n'y voit pas,
Nous voulons pour guider leurs pas,
Eclairer villes et campagnes !

Aux fils Electriciens ! Allumez vos charbons !
Brillons, brillons
Qu'un feu plus pur éclaire les nations î

Que peut contre nous la critique
De tous nos concurrents divers ?
Bientôt la lumière électrique
Flamboiera dans tout l'univers (bis)
Chez l'ennemi, vois quelle rage
Lumière tu viens d'exciter,
Car n'oses-tu pas méditer
D'éteindre le gaz d'éclairage !

refrain

Quoi ! Nos acharnés adversaires
De notre succès effrayés,
Croient-ils donc que leurs luminaires
Prévaudront contre nos foyers ? (bis)
Sachons mépriser leur conduite !
Rions de leur aveuglement
Par Volta faisons le serment
De mettre un jour le gaz en fuite !

refrain

Tremblez, assassins et perfides,
Qui nous dévalisez la nuit,
Tremblez, vos projets homicides
Sont déjoués quand le soleil luit ! (bis)
Combien a-t-on fait de victimes
Grâce au gaz, dans les carrefours,
Mais quand les nuits seront des jours...
On ne commettra plus de crimes !!

refrain

Amour sacré de la batt'rie
Conduis, soutiens nos fils vainqueurs
Ô ! Electricité chérie,
Flanque une pile aux détracteurs ! (bis)
Pour mettre un comble à leur déboire,
Que ces allumeurs de lampions
Soient foudroyés par les rayons
Que sur eux répandra ta gloire !

refrain

Nous éclipserons la lumière
Des vieux éclairages connus,
Huile, pétrole et gaz, arrière !
Tous bientôt vous ne serez plus ! (bis)
Quand vous aurez cessé de vivre,
Quand seuls nous taperons dans l'œil
Nous pourrons dire avec orgueil,
Pour voir clair, c'est nous qu'il faut suivre !

refrain

A popular French anthem sung by electricians

Lighting the darkness without using a flame was a revolution! Perpetual daylight, without the dangers of fire. Though electrical phenomena have been observed since the dawn of time, it took the whole of the 19th century to master electric power. Its first applications involved locomotion and it was not until 1878 that Thomas Edison invented the incandescent electric light. Its filament was made of Japanese bamboo and burned out after 30 hours.

Dinner at the Ball - Edgar Degas
Dinner at the Ball

Here Edgar Degas copied a painting by the great artist Adolph Menzel, "Dinner at the Ball." Menzel's painting was finished in 1878 and exhibited in Paris the following year with other works by the German artist. It is easy to imagine what a pleasure it was for Degas to copy this work, both because of its theme and its dazzling depiction of light.

In 1880 La Gazette des Beaux-Arts underscored Menzel's virtuosity in the rendering of light: "His passion for light at times spurs him to overcome great difficulties; he tracks light's undulations and vibrations from every angle, the way they tail off subtly, their sharpness, the way they glint off jutting objects, their artful creation of transparency in shadows and how they transform tone by adding the clean coloration they bring with them from their sources."

Edgar Degas

Born in Paris in 1834, Edgar Degas (real name de Gas) belonged to a rich bourgeois family of Neapolitan origin. He did not begin his study of painting until 1855, after receiving a classical education.

However, attracted by the Renaissance painters, he left for Italy, where he traveled from 1856 to 1860. He went first to Naples, staying with relatives, then on to Rome and Florence, where he met Gustave Moreau. The paintings of his youth, mostly portraits of his family members, are neoclassical in style. Yet Degas's interest in intimist and risqué subjects (cabarets, theaters and bordellos), his compositions inspired by photographic framing (high-angle and low-angle shots) and his long conversations with his friend Manet gradually put him off that style. As of 1874, he began frequenting impressionist painters, though he did not subscribe to their theory about light (he preferred artificial light) or enjoy working on subjects (he painted solely from memory).

Degas, then, is an unclassifiable artist, who stopped painting in the early 1890s—he was very nearly blind by then—but who continued to sculpt until his death in 1917.

© RMN (Musée d'Orsay) / Hervé Lewandowski