Opera Fan and Ernest Reyer 1877

Curator: Edgar Degas rendered this pencil drawing in 1877. It's titled, “Opera Fan and Ernest Reyer.” The name alone gives us a keyhole glimpse into Parisian cultural life during the Belle Époque. Editor: It’s wonderfully evocative, though almost ghostly, with the sketchy lines barely tethering the figures to the page. Is that intended to reflect the fleeting nature of performance? The man in front with the binoculars certainly seems absorbed in something just beyond our view. Curator: Perhaps, but knowing Degas, the intention could be to depict modern leisure culture, too. Opera wasn’t just entertainment, but also a social space, a public theater of manners and power. And this is Reyer, a notable composer and critic, immortalized by his contemporary. Editor: Indeed, the act of observation seems very important here. Reyer himself likely was observing the performance or perhaps scrutinizing the audience. The other figure, partially obscured, hints at the layered social context. One could suggest he represents the collective audience. Curator: Precisely. Degas repeatedly captured these behind-the-scenes perspectives. The drawing offers us not only a portrait of Reyer but of the operagoer archetype as well, someone intimately invested in the music and spectacle. We could even argue the binoculars become a potent symbol. Editor: A symbol of bourgeois access, or even of intrusive surveillance, reflecting how performances were consumed, reviewed, and even controlled. Considering how operas shape the public mood… What hidden stories lie behind the figures who shape such grand cultural works? Curator: Well said! So this image gives viewers an occasion to delve into cultural life. Through the figures, the drawing highlights the dynamic relations between creative forces, the social spaces in which they work, and the audience. It helps us reflect on culture and power relations, visible and invisible in the artwork. Editor: A tantalizing sketch then, that sketches a world for the informed contemporary audiences of the era—while also inviting questions about access, celebrity, spectatorship for a later era of artistic experimentation.