190 Today

 Born on this day 190 years ago was Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, who would go on to simplify his name to Edgar Degas and become one of the greatest draughtsmen who ever drew – the greatest since the high renaissance, in Kenneth Clark's estimation. 
Here, to mark his birthday, is Degas's Les Repasseuses, an oil painting on rough brown canvas showing women in a laundry wearily working their way through a pile of ironing  ('repasser' in French, so much more expressive of the action than 'ironing').
And here is a poem by R.S. Thomas inspired by the painting (which hangs in the Musée d'Orsay) –

one hand
     on cheek the other
on the bottle
     mouth open
her neighbour
     with hands clasped
not in prayer
      her head bent
over her decreasing
      function     this is art
overcoming permanently
     the temptation to answer
a yawn with a yawn


['decreasing function' is brilliant]