While Degas’ youthful drawings produced some notable individual prices in Drawings Week, it is the classic charcoal and pastel drawings of Parisian dancers and workers from his mature years that are the most commercially popular (the current work on paper record is the premium inclusive $37m/ £23.35m/€29m paid for Danseuse au repos of 1879 at Sotheby’s New York in 2008).
The highest sum for a drawing by the Impressionist in Paris last month came in Christie’s Impressionist and Modern works on paper sale on March 23. Danseuse au Bouquet, shown left, a 23 x 18in (60 x 46cm) charcoal and stump on blue paper study realised a mid-estimate €480,000 (£417,391).