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Henry Moore

Art genre: Modernism, Surrealism
Art media: Sculpture, paintings.

Life: Born in Castleford, West Yorkshire, in 1898, Moore was the son of a mine manager. He became an elementary school teacher until he joined the army when he was 17. In 1919 an ex-servicemen's grant enabled him to go to Leeds School of Art where he won a scholarship to the Royal College of Art in London. He later became an Assistant in the Sculpture Department at the College. In 1929, he married Irina Radetzsky and bought a cottage in Kent where he could work during the college holidays. Later they moved to Hampstead where they were part of an influential group that included Ben Nicholson and Barbara Hepworth. After the Second World War began, Moore's drawings of people sheltering in the London Underground during the Blitz caught the attention of the War Artists Advisory Board and he worked for them until 1943. He returned to sculpture and his work was internationally recognised. He won the main prize for sculpture at the 1948 Venice Bienniale. He was commissioned to make bigger works, his studios and gardens expanded and he employed a number of assistants. He was made a Companion of Honour in 1955 and a member of the Order of Merit in 1963. He died in Hertfordshire in 1986.

Work:When Moore moved to London in 1921 he developed an interest in primitive art and sculpture. He used a method of direct carving for his own work, in which everything was carved by hand and the tool marks are visible. His first one-man show in 1926 was well-received and he was commissioned to provide a sculpture for the headquarters of the London Underground. His work was controversial and contributed to him leaving the Royal College of Art and becoming a tutor at the Chelsea School of Art. Although not keen to be associated with a particular style of art, Moore exhibited in the International Exhibition of Surrealist Art in London in 1936 and an exhibition of Cubist and Abstract art in New York. In 1943, he was commissioned to sculpt a figure of a Virgin and Child for St Matthew's Church in Northampton and he produced his first ‘draped figure'. In 1946, there was a retrospective of his work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York; the exhibition was subsequently taken to Chicago, San Francisco and Australia. In the early 1950s he moved away from direct carving towards modelling and built a foundry at the bottom of his garden in Hertfordshire. He was asked to produce massive sculptures that had to be cast, such as the Reclining Figure for the Lincoln Centre in New York. He and his assistants produced models and maquettes before making the final sculptures and many of these were cast as small bronzes. In 1977 he established the Henry Moore Foundation to promote public interest in art and preserve his work. The Foundation manages the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds that supports exhibitions and research into international sculpture.

Find out more:
www.en.wikipedia.org
www.henry-moore-fdn.co.uk

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