Henry Moore - Hardcover

David Mitchinson

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 8843528467 ISBN 13: 9788843528462

Publisher: Mondadori Electa, 1989

Synopsis

The works of Henry Moore, so often placed outside government buildings and industrial corporations, have almost the air of official monuments. Following the war, he established an unrivalled reputation as the quasi-official voice of British sculpture. Yet his standing has in some ways obscured the complexity and variety of his themes, defusing the more disquieting aspects of his work. David Mitchinson, curator of the Henry Moore Foundation, describes his early career and diverse influences, his interest in natural forms, geology and Mexican Aztec sculpture. Julian Stallabrass analyzes, in particular, critical reaction to Moore after the war describing how his work became acceptable to a wide audience as his pieces "accorded well with a consensus view of the unity and harmony of the nation and the caring roles adopted by the state, family and individuals within it". Presenting the major sculptures for 60 years of his highly productive life as an artist, this study represents the whole spectrum of Moore's work from intimate figures to monumental pieces. Most of the photographs in this book were taken by the artist.

About this title

From Publishers Weekly

Affording a rounded view of the English sculptor's output and career, this concise, handsomely illustrated survey joins 203 plates (182 in color) with two introductory essays by staff members of the Henry Moore Foundation. Mitchinson briefly reviews the artist's experimentation during the 1930s, when he created delicate stringed figures carved in a variety of woods and "transformation drawings" that turned shells, twigs and pebbles into realizable sculptural forms. Stallabrass astutely sifts various critical readings of Moore's work, which has been seen as tragic, humanistic, apocalyptic, inhuman and an embodiment of the Freudian psyche. Beneath the sculpture's surface familiarity he finds "a set of repressed themes" centering on masculine aggression, the creative act and the inhuman mechanization of the self. The illustrations range from a graceful, classic Head of the Virgin (1922) to miniatures of the 1930s, the delightful Rocking Chair series, heroic torsos and mother-and-child pairs.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Mondadori Electa
• Publication date: 1989
• ISBN 10: 8843528467
• ISBN 13: 9788843528462
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 320