Add to ORKGIn 1858 - 59, Degas spent several months in Italy with his aunt, the Baroness Bellelli. He made a number of sketches while in Italy, but this life-sized portrait was produced later. Two of the figures (the mother and standing girl) are carefully posed, apparently aware that someone is looking at them. The baron, with his back to the viewer, has just begun to realise that something is happening. Throughout his life, Degas would continue to work long hours in the studio to achieve this kind of apparent spontaneity. Degas never sold this painting, perhaps because it revealed too much about his aunt\u27s unhappy marriage to the Baron. It remained in his studio until after his death.https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/saskia/4304/thumbnail.jp