Maillol only turned to sculpture in the 1890s, when his failing eyesight forced him to give up his tapestry work. He experimented first with wood carvings and then began moulding statuettes in clay. In about 1900 Ambroise Vollard bought some of these terracotta statuettes and had them cast in bronze. Later, in 1902, he exhibited several of Maillol's tapestries and about thirty of his statuettes in his gallery in the rue Lafitte. The bronze figure, Baigneuse debout sans Draperie, is characteristic of Maillol's early work; its simple, smooth contours suggest a form of idealised beauty. There is no unneccessary detail, no complicated gestures. Maillol moulded his female figures in calm, noble forms.

In his introduction to the Rosenberg exhibition catalogue, John Rewald wrote, "To celebrate the human body, particularly the feminine body, seems to have been Maillol's only aim. He did this in a style from which all grandiloquence is absent, a style almost earthbound and grave. The absence of movement, however, is compensated by a tenderness and charm distinctively his own; and while all agitation is foreign to his art, there is in his work, especially in his small statuettes, such quiet grace and such warm feeling that they never appear inanimate. He has achieved a peculiar balance between a firmness of forms which appear eternal and a sensitivity of expression - even sensuousness - which seems forever quivering and alive." (J. Rewald, Maillol, New York, 1958-60, pp. 6-7).

Dina Vierny has kindly confirmed the authenticity of this work in a letter dated Paris, le 13 April 1994. It is the first variant of three sculptures of the same figure.