Mademoiselle Marie Dihau (1843–1935)

Marie Dihau was a successful pianist and singer who lived in Lille but often came to Paris to perform. She recalled that Degas executed this portrait quickly at a restaurant. Shown in sharp profile, wedged between the remnants of a finished meal and a carpetbag, the sitter—a traveling musician whom Degas typically caught on the run—effectively makes a cameo appearance in this compelling character study.　 Her brother Désiré, a bassoonist for the Paris Opéra, is the second figure from the left in Degas’s The Ballet from Robert le Diable (29.100.552).