Mrs Jeantaud in the Mirror

Degas had served in the National Guard during the siege of Paris in 1870, and one of the men he stood watch with was Jean-Baptiste Jeantaud. A few years later, around 1875, he painted Jeantaud's wife Berthe, dressed to go out, pausing at a mirror. We see her twice, a crisp profile and beside it a softer, dimmer reflection that doesn't quite match. Degas was fascinated by that gap between a person and their image, and he kept returning to mirrors and doubled viewpoints for the rest of his life. Berthe seems caught in a private, ordinary moment, checking herself before she leaves, not posing for a portrait at all.