Why did Edgar Degas prefer working in a studio instead of painting outdoors?

Unlike many of his contemporaries in the Impressionist movement, Edgar Degas famously disdained the practice of painting en plein-air, or working outdoors. While his colleagues were known for their improvised outdoor landscape studies, Degas insisted on working within the controlled environment of his studio.1

His preference for the studio was rooted in his artistic process, which relied heavily on the habit of drawing in preparation for his final compositions. Rather than capturing the fleeting effects of light in nature, Degas focused on manipulating the nuances of gesture, form, and composition through careful, deliberate study. By working in the studio, he could engage in complex, iterative exercises—such as retracing charcoal drawings on tracing paper—to create series of related compositions that elevated the fundamentals of picture-making to an independent level. Although he did occasionally experiment with outdoor subjects, such as a series of pastel landscapes on the Normandy coast in 1869, he remained committed to the studio as his primary workspace throughout his career.12