Henry Moore

This text is published to coincide with an exhibition in Nantes and Mannheim. It examines Henry Moore's ideas for all types of sculpture that he worked on himself. As he did not physically cast them himself, the book contains none of Moore's bronzes, yet it fully documents his plasters, which were one step away from a final casting in bronze. The main text of the book is the author's analysis of Moore in the context of 20th-century sculpture. Catherine Ferbos-Nakov and Claude Cosneau-Allemande discuss Moore and Surrealism in France. Biographical notes written by Celia Hodart offer insight from one sculptor viewing another's life and work, and contain anecdotes. Information about the included photographs is offered by the Henry Moore Foundation, giving both art historical and personal background information. In his earliest work (1921-39), Moore's ideas were formulated as carvings. He supplemented these with drawings - examples included here date from 1924 to 1980 - and, from the date 1940, with plasters, illustrated with pieces from 1951 to 1982. Moore loved to work with plaster.
He would model it when wet, carve it when dry and then perhaps add handfuls of wet plaster and carve it again in an organic process of correction until he obtained the final form he required. Forming, touching and feeling were of paramount importance in his work. Many of the plasters are "hand held" maquettes, miniatures of works of art that were destined to be many times larger. Moore had a team of assistants who enlarged these maquettes mathematically. The artist then carried out any alterations he desired, ready for the mould to be made at the foundry. The comparative illustrations in this text show Moore's working methods and chart the stages in the creation of his work, from the original drawings to the final sculpture. Perhaps most exciting is the comparison of plaster to the finished bronze.