The Races

Edgar Degas

National Gallery of Art

Six jockeys wearing colorful silks sit astride brown and black horses on a grassy field in this horizontal painting. Two more riders wearing top hats sit a bit farther back from the group, and two horses run on a grass track behind that. Five of the jockeys are together in the lower left quadrant. From left to right, they wear a black jersey with white sleeves, pink with black sleeves, black with sky-blue sleeves, emerald green, and canary yellow. The sixth jockey approaches from the right and wears white. The horizon comes about a third of the way up the composition, and the lawn is painted with blended strokes of spruce green and tawny brown. Three smokestacks belching smoke line the horizon, and three towers, two with spires, presumably represent a church in the deep distance to the left. Strokes of ochre yellow, beige, cream white, and brown represent houses clustered along the horizon. Lilac-purple-tinged clouds sweep across the watery blue sky above. The landscape is loosely painted with visible or blended strokes. The artist signed the lower right corner, “Degas.”