Degas' Dancers: Behind The Scences, At The Barre

"It's not often that an art show makes visitors stand up straighter. But Degas's Dancers at the Barre: Point and Counterpoint — an exhibition at the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C. — has that effect. Ballet dancers in gauzy skirts stretch and bend and twist on oil and pastel canvases in the museum's galleries, which showcase more than 30 works by Edgar Degas."

"The last gallery even includes two mirrors and a real ballet barre, mounted at hip height along one mirror. When a dancer from the Washington Ballet reached the end of the exhibit, she couldn't resist stretching one leg on the barre."

"You can't just walk past it," says Morgann Rose, a principal dancer with the Washington Ballet. "I see a ballet barre, and I have to do something — [it's] kind of an addiction," she laughs.