Research Catalog

Title

Foyer de la danse [graphic].

Publication

[184-?-185-?]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

• Staines, Robert, 1805-1849.
• Lami, Eugène Louis, 1800-1890.
• Guérard, Eugène Charles François, 1821-1866.
• Montaut, H. de.
• Champagne, Jules.
• Committee for the Jerome Robbins Dance Division. fnd

Description

• 1 print : steel engraving, hand-colored; 21 x 27 cm., image 11 x 17 cm.
• 1 print : steel engraving, b&w ;
• 1 print : lithograph, color ;
• 1 print : wood engraving, b&w ;

Summary

Representations of the Foyer de la danse or green room of the Paris Opéra, a meeting place for performers and their admirers.

Donor/Sponsor

Dance Committee Purchase Fund.

Subjects

• Ballet dancers > France > 19th century
• Engravings
• Emarot, Célestine, 1824-1892
• Elssler, Fanny, 1810-1884
• Lithographs
• Opéra de Paris

Genre/Form

• Engravings.
• Lithographs.

Note

• Title devised by cataloger.
• Items 1 and 2 are colored and uncolored versions of an image somewhat modified from Eugène Lami's original watercolor. At left, a bonneted woman adjusting a dancer's costume has replaced a group of men surrounding the ballerina Caroline Forster. The costume and headdress of the dancer in movement, immediately to their right, has been altered and made more elaborate. The number of figures in the central group has been reduced, and now includes only the poet Alfred de Musset (in three-quarter back view), the Comte de Belmont, and the ballerina Fanny Elssler. The right side of the picture has also been altered but retains the figure of Lautour-Mezeray, who leans against a pillar facing the dancer Célestine Emarot. A watering pot, used to moisten the floor to prevent the dancers from slipping, has been added to the right of Elssler.
• Item 1: The green-room of the Opera; Foyer des acteurs à l'Opéra; Garderobe-Zimmer des Opernhauses [colored engraving]; London, Fisher, Son & Co.; Paris, H. Mandeville; Eugène Lami [artist]; R. Staines [engraver].
• item 2: The green room of the Opera (Paris) [uncolored engraving]; London, published for the proprietor by Longman & Co.; Eugène Lami; R. Staines.
• Item 3: Le foyer de l'Opéra, Soirées parisiennes, no. 10, dessiné par H. de Montaut; J. Champagne lith. Colored lithograph centering on two white-clad female dancers with crescent moon ornaments on their heads; one carries a bow, suggesting that she is playing the huntress goddess Artemis or Diana. They are surrounded by three men in evening clothes. A dancer at right practices a dance with castanets. The young woman at left holds a fan before her face as she chats with an admirer; an older woman, possibly her mother, adjusts the back of her costume.
• Item 4: Foyer de la danse, à l'Opéra, 1853, E. Guerard [artist]. Trimmed wood-engraving. In the foreground a young woman in peasant costume dances, apparently oblivious to her surroundings although a seated man intently fixes his gaze upon her. Behind her a dancer in long plaits and a plumed headdress converses with three men, and at right another man leans towards a performer in male costume, possibly a woman en travesti. A watering-pot stands at foreground center.

Indexed In (note)

• reproduced in Great ballet prints of the Romantic era, compiled by Parmenia Migel, New York, Dover, 1981
• Kahane, Martine, Le foyer de la danse, Paris, Ministère de la culture et de la communication, Éditions de la Réunion de musées nationaux, 1988
• Chaffee, George, "Three or four graces: a centenary salvo," [including] "Catalogue of the French souvenir lithographs (and varia) of the Romantic ballet," Dance index

Funding (note)

• Green-room of the Opera was purchased with funds from the Committee for the Jerome Robbins Dance Division.

Source (note)

• Lincoln Kirstein.

Biography (note)

• In her monograph of the same title, dance scholar Martine Kahane has called the Foyer de la danse a phenomenon exclusively linked to the Paris Opéra, and identifies its high point as the years 1820-1880, covering the approximate dates when these prints were made. The meetings that took place there between dancers, singers, and other performers with their male admirers (who were usually affluent and of a higher social class) were replete with secondary meanings that often had little to do with the appreciation of their art. The interactions between dancers and their patrons were treated by Edgar Degas and other artists of the time, often providing a pretext for social commentary or satire.
• Eugène Lami's original watercolor is reproduced in Guest, Ivor, The Romantic ballet in Paris, London, Pitman, 1966, fig. 3. It includes a key to the persons depicted.

Call Number

*MGZFX Foy 1-4

OCLC

825110486

Title

Foyer de la danse [graphic].

Imprint

[184-?-185-?]

Indexed In:

Item 1 reproduced in Great ballet prints of the Romantic era, compiled by Parmenia Migel, New York, Dover, 1981, no. 37.

Kahane, Martine, Le foyer de la danse, Paris, Ministère de la culture et de la communication, Éditions de la Réunion de musées nationaux, 1988, cat. nos. 2, 3, 4.

Le foyer de l'Opéra, Chaffee, George, "Three or four graces: a centenary salvo," [including] "Catalogue of the French souvenir lithographs (and varia) of the Romantic ballet," Dance index, vol. III, nos. 9-11, Sept.-Nov. 1944, p. 168, 202; plate XXI, cat. no. 131.

Funding

Green-room of the Opera was purchased with funds from the Committee for the Jerome Robbins Dance Division.

Biography

In her monograph of the same title, dance scholar Martine Kahane has called the Foyer de la danse a phenomenon exclusively linked to the Paris Opéra, and identifies its high point as the years 1820-1880, covering the approximate dates when these prints were made. The meetings that took place there between dancers, singers, and other performers with their male admirers (who were usually affluent and of a higher social class) were replete with secondary meanings that often had little to do with the appreciation of their art. The interactions between dancers and their patrons were treated by Edgar Degas and other artists of the time, often providing a pretext for social commentary or satire.

Eugène Lami's original watercolor is reproduced in Guest, Ivor, The Romantic ballet in Paris, London, Pitman, 1966, fig. 3. It includes a key to the persons depicted.

Local Note

Cataloging funds provided by Friends of Jerome Robbins Dance Division.

For another version of R. Staines's engraving after Eugène Lami, with different coloration, see: *MGZFD Sta R Foy 1.

Source

Foyer de l'Opéra Gift; Lincoln Kirstein.

Connect to:

NYPL Digital Collections

Added Author

Staines, Robert, 1805-1849. Engraver

Lami, Eugène Louis, 1800-1890. Artist

Guérard, Eugène Charles François, 1821-1866. Artist

Montaut, H. de. Artist

Champagne, Jules. Lithographer

Kirstein, Lincoln, 1907-1996. Donor

Committee for the Jerome Robbins Dance Division. Funder

Research Call Number

*MGZFX Foy 1-4