Dancer at Rest, Hands Behind Her Back, Right Leg Forward (Danseuse au repos, les mains sur les hanches, jambe droite en avant, première étude)

This sculpture depicts a young dancer of the Paris Opéra posed in ballet’s fourth position. Edgar Degas made such small-scale studies with wax and other modeling compounds as a means to experiment in three dimensions with the movements and poses he would portray in his paintings. These were private works, not intended for display, but when his heirs found them in his studio after his death, they selected seventy-four of them to cast in bronze in limited editions.