Plaster,  49.5X30x28 cm, Inv. n, 1566

Elisabetta Santolini, nicknamed Bitta, was the beloved muse of Domenico Baccarini. The life companion of the artist from 1903, early in 1906 she was portrayed by Baccarini in a wide variety of poses. From the innocent, ecstatic and melancholy young girl of this sculpture, reproduced in various others, Bitta was to be portrayed as the emblem of motherhood, pregnant, while nursing or bathing the infant Maria Teresa, and even in works in a more Expressionistic style.
With this work, which can be dated early 1904, Baccarini had already completed his first attempts at sculpture where, after having terminated the course in sculpting at the School of Design in 1900, he demonstrated prodigious skills and manifested a willingness to try new symbolic motifs. It was during these years that Baccarini also created bas-reliefs with interesting spatial modulations and new symbolic figures, like in the sculpture Sensations of the soul created in 1903 or in the production of ceramic objects where he opens up to hints of Art Nouveau and floral designs with beautiful results.