Nude Man Standing, with Left Hand Raised c. 1900

Edgar Degas created this charcoal drawing of a nude man standing, with left hand raised, in France, likely in the late 19th century. The male nude held a central place in the French academic art system that Degas both embraced and challenged. Such drawings were a mainstay of artistic training, emphasizing anatomical precision. Yet Degas's quick, expressive strokes diverge from the highly finished nudes favored by the Academy. In its radical incompleteness, Degas's study throws into relief the social function of the academic nude: to promote a vision of idealized masculinity. We might look to medical and scientific illustrations of the period to understand how standards of the nude body were constructed and disseminated. By exploring such visual culture, we come to see how the very category of the nude was shaped by social and institutional forces.