La sfilata

Horse racing was still a fairly new import to France when Degas took it up as a subject in the mid-1860s. The organized track, the thoroughbreds, even the word jockey, all came over from England, and by the Second Empire the racecourse had become the fashionable place for well-off Parisians like Degas to spend an afternoon. This is one of his first paintings on the theme. He skips the race entirely. The horses parade in front of the stands before the start, one of them shying nervously, riders in bright silks strung out in a loose line across the ground. Degas cared less about who would win than about the shapes, the long shadows and the gap of open track. He would paint horses and riders for the rest of his life.