Edgar Degas is an artist considered one of the founding fathers of Impressionism.
However, he is also known to have distanced himself from many Impressionist painters, and to have aimed for his own style of realism.
In addition to these stylistic differences, there are other surprising facts about Degas.

Degas, Self Portrait

1. what ballerinas are called

Degas painted ballerinas repeatedly, and many of his works remain in museums.
However, it is said that Degas referred to them as "little monkey girls."
It is known that Degas was a bona fide misogynist.
In a feature in Vanity Fair magazine, art historian John Richardson states that Degas enjoyed seeing his models in anguish and preferred depictions of "raw and bleeding" feet, which he would "peek through the keyhole" under stress.

Edgar Degas, The Dance Class (1873-1876)

Degas was a lifelong bachelor.

Degas never married during his life, which was unusual for an aristocrat of his time.
Why was he a bachelor? Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that he equated women with racehorses.
Degas once said, "Maybe I thought of women too much as animals.

Edgar Degas, A Cotton Office in New Orleans (1873)

3. was a virulent anti-Semite.

According to the Chicago Tribune, Degas's anti-Semitism grew out of the Dreyfus affair, in which a Jewish French officer was falsely accused of treason.
France was divided, and so were the artists.
Degas is said to have developed anti-Semitic sentiments after his family's failed entrepreneurial ventures on behalf of Jewish competitors.

Edgar Degas, Homme nu couché (1855)

4. "The Old Curmudgeon."

In the 1918 issue of the Burlington Magazine for Conocers, Irish novelist George Moore disputed the reputation of Degas as an old curmudgeon.
Moore revealed that Degas presented himself as such in order to keep people away.
Degas is said to have explained that an artist must live apart and his private life must not be known.

Race Horses, c.1873

5. he disliked impressionism.

Contrary to popular belief, Degas preferred to be considered an independent rather than an Impressionist (much less one of its founding members).
Degas was very assertive about his style and initially refused to associate himself with other movements. It was also around this time that Degas decided to become a history painter.
He distanced himself from artists such as Monet, Renoir, and Sisley, who are considered central to the Impressionist movement, and did not paint landscapes.
In the latter half of the Impressionist exhibition, Degas and his school dominated the exhibition with a style different from that of the so-called Impressionists.

Degas, Edgar: A Woman Seated Beside a Vase of Flowers