Review: Degas at the Burrell 'is art world blockbuster in the making'

But the show, titled Discovering Degas, offers more than just a deep dive into the work of a man whose career spanned painting, sculpture and even photography. It is also acts as a survey of the fruits of the collecting bug which struck Sir William Burrell as a boy and saw him amass thousands of artworks over the course of his life, many of which he loaned to art galleries and museums and the bulk of which was left to the city of Glasgow.

Among that number are a cool 23 works by Degas, shown here together for the first time. The show itself is the biggest survey of Degas' paintings in Scotland since the late 1970s. Prior to that you have to go back to the Edinburgh Festival exhibition of 1952 to find anything similar. Of course borrowing art works was easier back then. Different story these days, so this is a big deal for Glasgow.

Jockeys in the Rain by Edgar Degas, c.1883-1886 which will feature in the Discovering Degas: Collecting in the Age of William Burrell (Image: free)

Burrell probably saw his first painting by the Frenchman at the 1888 Glasgow International Exhibition and had certainly purchased his first work by 1894. However the bulk of his collection was acquired between 1921, four years after the artist's death, and 1937.

Joining them are a further 28 from some of the world’s top galleries, including London venues the British Museum, the Tate, the V&A and the National Gallery, as well as storied Paris gallery the Musée d’Orsay, which doubles as a sort of Impressionist HQ.

Of the loan works on display, it's unsurprising that the Musée's In A Café (L'Absinthe) is one of the stars. Degas' famous (and famously intriguing) study shows a pair of drinkers in a Paris café and was considered so dangerous it was hissed at when it came up for auction in London in the early 1890s.

Of the other loan works, Jockeys Before The Race deserves to have a crowd round it too: an upright canvas (it's hard not to think of a smartphone screen) shows three mounted jockeys under a hazy sun in a camomile-coloured sky, the image bisected a third of the way across by a thick pole. Remove pole and riders and it's almost a Rothko.

Visitors are greeted first by the grand, shadowy Ballet Scene From Meyerbeer's Opera Robert Le Diable (Degas did like his matter-of-fact titles), the first painting by the artist to enter a public collection in the UK. Next to it is Two Dancers On A Stage. Taken together they illustrate Degas' concerns as an artist, or certainly the sorts of subjects he liked to paint and the milieu in which he felt at home. There's more of that elsewhere: cafés, street scenes, more dancers, more jockeys, even the circus.

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Discovering Degas at the Burrell: where to get tickets

Otherwise the show is presented thematically. There are seven of his bronze sculptures, a section on his passion for Japan and Japanese art, one on his fascination with laundresses (he loved their bare arms and rolled up sleeves) and another on the Big Top and its denizens. His swirling, action-shot pastel study of circus strong-woman Anna Olga Albertina Brown (stage name: Miss La La) is his only portrait of a named person of colour.

The largest sections are reserved for the artist's paintings of ballerinas and dancers – there's a near-abstract study of whirling Ukrainian folk dancers – and for his many nudes. He once described his female subjects, particularly the nudes, as “simple, straightforward creatures.”

You can make of that what you will, but it's worth considering in light of beliefs he held which are undeniably problematic. He was deeply anti-Semitic, his family had strong connections to the slave trade and his brother was a member of a group of white supremacists. Thankfully, Discovering Degas is as good as its title: it doesn't shy away from any of this.

Providing context to Burrell's habits of acquisition, meanwhile, are a series of panels looking at his fellow collectors and occasional rivals – people such as Henry Hill, Samuel Courtauld, Scottish industrialist Peter Coats, and husband and wife team Louis Huth and Helen Ogilvy (another Scot). Also the dealers Paul Durand-Ruel and Alexander Reid, whose likeness by Vincent van Gogh hangs on a wall near the entrance.

The Green Ballet Skirt by Edgar Degas (Image: free)

Adding yet more background are cases of letters and acquisition books. One of these is opened at the page which shows Burrell's acquisition, on December 3, 1917, of Degas' painting Three Dancers from Alexander Reid. The dealer made a loss on the sale, we learn.

Often, though, it's the familiar palette which jumps out as much as the subject matter. Seeing this up close is a thrill in itself: the burnt orange and dull turquoise, or the weird, sickly green which washes over works such as 1898's A Group Of Dancers.

Another dance-themed work, Dancers At The Barre, is painted sketchily on vivid green paper and is a startling thing to see as you turn the corner. Other works from other periods are thickly painted, dark and brooding, or light and airy and rendered in pastel. There was certainly a range to the man – as there is to this impressive survey of his work, an art world blockbuster in the making.

Discovering Degas: Collecting In The Time Of William Burrell opens at the Burrell Collection, Glasgow tomorrow (May 24 until September 30)