Dancer ready to dance, one foot forward
Edgar Germain Hilaire Degas
From the late 1860s Degas took up sculpture, focusing in particular on ballerinas. Degas modelled his figures in a highly malleable mixture of wax and clay, using ordinary things like matchsticks, wire and wine corks to strengthen them. Here a bit of wire used as an armature is visible poking out of the right hand. Degas never had any of his sculpture cast in bronze.