Portrait of the Engraveurs Desboutin and Lepic

This double portrait of the engravers Marcellin Desboutin and Ludovic Lepic, painted in 1877 and now at the Musée d'Orsay, shows two of Degas's close associates within the Impressionist circle. Desboutin, printmaker and bohemian intellectual, had already appeared in Degas's L'Absinthe of 1876; Lepic was an artist, archaeologist, and dog breeder known for his experimental approach to etching. The pairing captures a specific moment in the social world of Parisian bohemia, where the cafés and studios of Montmartre hosted an overlapping community of artists, critics, and writers whose informal interactions Degas documented with exceptional attentiveness.

The composition places the two figures side by side but with distinct spatial presences — Desboutin's bulk and darker colouring contrasted with Lepic's more angular profile. Degas's loose, sketchy application in background areas throws the heads into sharper focus, a technique he borrowed from his study of seventeenth-century Dutch portraiture.