Two Helena Smith Dayton Animation Figures. Both are signed. Dancing figures sculpted in plaster and hand-painted. Helena Smith Dayton (1879-1960) was an American film maker, painter and sculptor working on the East Coast who was an early pioneer of stop motion and clay animation techniques in the 1910’s and 1920’s, one of the first female animators to do so. Her work contributed to the release of one of the first stop motion films in 1917, an adaptation of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. 7"h. Condition: Good with wear.