Henry Moore Letter to John Rothenstein 4 April 1950
Henry Moore Letter to John Rothenstein 4 April 1950, Page 1Tate Public Records TG 4/2/742/2
Henry Moore Letter to John Rothenstein 4 April 1950, Page 2Tate Public Records TG 4/2/742/2
In this letter to John Rothenstein, Director of the Tate Gallery, Henry Moore discusses casting an additional example of the large Family Group 1949 (Tate N06004) especially for the Tate. Moore explains that he has discussed the proposal with his commercial dealer, Curt Valentin, based in New York, and Alfred Barr, who was in the process of purchasing a version of the sculpture for the Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Transcript
[Letterhead:]
TELEPHONE: MUCH HADAM 66 HOGLANDS,
PERRY GREEN,
MUCH HADHAM,
HERTS.
PERRY GREEN,
MUCH HADHAM,
HERTS.
[Handwritten:]
April 4th 1950
Dear John,
Here are the photographs of the FAMILY GROUP. They are not as good photographs as I’d like them to be, because any how plaster is a material not easy to photograph.
The colour and tone of the final image will be very different. It ought to look more solid. For plaster being so light, reflects back on itself, and so in these photographs the hollows and holes look too light and atmospheric. I wrote to [end of p.1] Curt Valentin and to Alfred Barr, to know if they had any objections to me doing four casts instead of only three –
I told them I wasn’t dying to make a fourth cast because each cast will have to have a month or more of work on it by me after it’s delivered to me by the Bronze Foundary – though of course I would like a cast of it to be available for the Tate Gallery should the Tate Gallery like to consider it.
I got the enclosed letter back from Curt Valentin – which looks to me that they all agree to a fourth cast if I press for it – but that Curt Valentin would like to sell his No.3 cast to the Tate – (having sold No.2 cast to the Museum of Modern Art.) [end of p.2]
I got the enclosed letter back from Curt Valentin – which looks to me that they all agree to a fourth cast if I press for it – but that Curt Valentin would like to sell his No.3 cast to the Tate – (having sold No.2 cast to the Museum of Modern Art.) [end of p.2]
[page missing]
How to cite
Henry Moore, Letter to John Rothenstein, 4 April 1950, in Henry Moore: Sculptural Process and Public Identity, Tate Research Publication, 2015, https://www