“Only the bad artists of the nineteenth century were frightened by the invention of photography; the good ones all welcomed it and used it. Degas liked it not only because it provided an accurate record, but because the snapshot showed him a means of escape from the classical rules of design. Through it he learnt to make a composition without the use of formal symmetry.”

—  Kenneth Clark

Source: The Romantic Rebellion (1973), Ch. 13: Degas

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Kenneth Clark 47
Art historian, broadcaster and museum director 1903–1983

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