Little Dancer of Fourteen Years
The "Little Dancer" wax sculpture we see today is a reworked version of the original sculpture that was shown in 1881. After seeing the wax sculpture in Degas’ living quarters in April 1903, the New York collector Louisine Havemeyer expressed interest in buying the wax. After proposing a bronze or cast wax of the sculpture, which Mrs. Havemeyer refused, Degas took his wax figure upstairs to his working studio and told Vollard he was reworking the sculpture for Havemeyer for 40,000 francs. Degas never sold the sculpture to Mrs. Havemeyer. After Degas died, it was found in a corner of his studio. Paul Lefond, Degas’ biographer, described the "Little Dancer" wax after Degas’ death as "nothing but a ruin;" and Mary Cassatt telegraphed Mrs. Havemeyer "Statue Bad Condition." However, the wax sculpture we know today is not a ruin. It is Degas' reworked second version of his wax figure. At some point before Degas extensively reworked his sculpture, he allowed a plaster to be cast from the wax figure. This recently re-discovered plaster records the "Little Dancer"’s original pose, bodice, and hairdo. The plaster is now in a private collection in the United States.
Lorenzo Domínguez
In 1939 Lorenzo Domínguez returned to Santiago de Chile and continued teaching sculpture at the Escuela de Bellas Artes. From June to September, 1939, three of his sculptures were exhibited at the New York Riverside Museum, in the Latin American Exhibition of Fine and Applied Art ("Lilión", "Saint Olalla" and "Cajal"). Between 1939 and 1941 Lorenzo Domínguez completed the monument "To Dr. Luis Calvo Mackenna", a Chilean pediatrician. This maternity scene in black basalt is located in the Parque Balmaceda of Santiago. He also completed an important black basalt sculpture, "Portrait of the Moon", the first of his "Planetarium series"; and a stone portrait of the "Painter Augusto Eguiluz". Domínguez's masterpiece from this period is "Victor Delhez", a portrait of the Belgian engraver, carved in Carrara marble.