Who sculpted The Little Dancer of Fourteen Years?

Edgar Degas sculpted The Little Dancer of Fourteen Years.

Degas began the sculpture around 1880, modeling a fourteen-year-old student from the Paris Opera Ballet school named Marie van Goethem. Unlike many polished marble or bronze sculptures of its era, the original was made in pigmented beeswax and supported by a metal armature. Degas presented the figure with a real bodice, tutu, ballet slippers, ribbon, and human-hair wig.

The sculpture first appeared at the Sixth Impressionist Exhibition in Paris in 1881. Its lifelike clothing and unconventional wax medium startled critics, who disagreed about whether the dancer looked modern, realistic, awkward, or even disturbing. Degas’s pose emphasizes physical discipline rather than idealized grace: the arms are held taut, and the feet rest in a ballet position.

The bronze versions seen in museums today were cast after Degas’s death. His heirs commissioned the Hébrard foundry to produce them between 1920 and 1936, resulting in at least 28 casts. Their tutus can differ, so museum versions may not look identical. The original wax sculpture remains especially important because it is the work Degas himself exhibited.