The original wax model for this sculpture was executed in 1866-67 and was cast in bronze between 1919 and 1921 in an edition of twenty-two, numbered from A-T plus two casts reserved for Degas' heirs and the founder, Hébrard.

H. Loyrette dates this sculpture circa 1867-8 (exh. cat., Degas, Paris, 1988, p. 137). It is certainly one of the first horses sculpted by Degas and according to John Rewald he made it in order to work out the correct position for the horse in the painting Mademoiselle Fiocre dans le Ballet 'La Source' in the Brooklyn Museum (Lesmoisne, no. 146). "Degas faced the problem of having to introduce into his composition a horse not as he might have imagined it for the occasion, but as it actually appeared in the scene he was picturing. Desiring to make a realistic work, and doubtless inspired by the example of his friend Cuvelier, Degas had the idea to model a horse in the same attitude he had observed in the ballet. By placing the horse in wax in the desired angle, he could later make use of it as a model for his painting ... That this ballet horse was one of the first he modelled is proved not only by the date of the painting, but also by the pose of the animal, for it seems only logical that the artist modelled standing horses before attempting more complicated poses." (J. Rewald, Degas Sculpture, the Complete Works, London, 1957, p. 15)