Henry Moore: Sculptural Process and Public Identity

Presented by the artist to Tate in 1978 as part of the Henry Moore Gift.

This abstract bronze sculpture consists of two vertically orientated disc-like shapes that each rise from a broad stem or neck mounted on a rectangular bronze base. The thin round shapes are positioned a short distance apart in front of each other but not in direct alignment so that one can always be seen behind the other.

To make this sculpture in bronze Moore first made a plaster model based on a smaller maquette he had created a few years previously. It is likely that the plaster model was built up over an armature of wood and wire, and then worked with files and other tools before its surfaces were smoothed with sandpaper. The full-size plaster model was then sent to the Noack Foundry in West Berlin, where it was cast in bronze.

The surfaces of the two discs reveal little as to whether they were created using the sand casting or lost wax casting technique. However, it is likely that they were sand cast because this was the preferred technique of the Noack Foundry and the smooth shapes of this sculpture lend themselves to sand casting. This process involves making a two-part mould of each component of the sculpture using a mixture of sand and clay or resin, which is then baked or hardened using a chemical process. The two parts of each mould are then fitted together to create a hollow cavity into which molten bronze can be poured. This casting method leaves at least two mould seams on the final sculpture, which can be removed after the bronze has cooled.

According to notes held at the Henry Moore Foundation the base of Moon Head was cast in London at the Art Bronze Foundry. Simple shapes like this were normally sand cast, and in this case it appears that the box used as the model was made out of fibreboard, for the finely chequered pattern of the fibreboard appears to have been reproduced on the underside of the base (fig.1). The two discs are attached to the base with three threaded rods and nuts, and one bolt.

After casting the bronze components would have been cleaned and the surfaces smoothed with files and sandpaper. The golden and speckled brown colour of this sculpture was created by spraying or flicking patination chemicals onto the discs with a brush while heat was applied to the bronze surface. While the recessed areas of the sculpture are generally darker in colour, the high points were rubbed down to allow the lighter golden tones to shine through (fig.2). The bronze base has a varied dark brown, reddish patina, achieved by applying the chemicals thinly in multiple layers with a brush. It is possible that the base was cast in a slightly different type of bronze, which produced a different colour during patination. After the colour had been applied a lacquer was added to the sculpture to preserve the brightness of the bronze. Faint drip marks can be seen on parts of the sculpture where the lacquer ran down the surface before it dried (fig.3).

This work exists in an edition of nine plus one artist’s cast. Tate’s sculpture is signed ‘Moore’ and numbered ‘0/9’ on the base, indicating that this was originally the artist’s copy (fig.4).

Moon Head 1964 is a bronze sculpture comprised of two thin, irregularly shaped disc-like forms that each stem from an elliptical tubular neck mounted on a bronze base. The two sections of the sculpture are similarly sized and positioned in parallel with each other a few centimetres apart, although they are not aligned directly so that a part of one can always be seen behind the other (fig.1). Seen from each end, it is possible to look through the narrow canyon-like passage between the two pieces (fig.2). From these side views it is evident that each disc has gently undulating surfaces and that each one thins as it tapers towards its upper edge. The way in which the two discs appear to gravitate towards and away from each other at various points gives the impression that the sculpture had, at one time, been a single unit that has been peeled apart.

The outer edges of the sculpture are thin, akin to a knife-edge, and feature irregularly shaped gouges that extend towards the centre of each disc. One disc has a large round shape cut from its upper edge (fig.3), while the other disc has an elongated U-shaped notch cut into its lower right edge (fig.4). Although the sculpture was designed to be seen in the round, and has no obvious front or back, Moore did indicate in 1968 that he regarded the disc with the larger incision at its top as ‘the back’.1

The design of Moon Head is a scaled enlargement of Moore’s Maquette for Head and Hand 1962 (fig.5). Taking its title as a guide, this earlier sculpture can be understood to comprise a head – represented by the disc with the lower horizontal incision, which may denote an open mouth – and a hand – conveyed by the gap in the other disc, which appears to delineate a thumb and forefinger. To create an enlarged bronze version of this sculpture, Moore would have first made a full-size model in plaster, built up over a supportive armature made of wire or wood (fig.6). This work was probably undertaken in his studio at his home, Hoglands, in Perry Green, Hertfordshire. Using an array of tools – including chisels, files and sandpaper – Moore could create different textures according to how wet or dry the plaster was, and these were replicated in the final bronze version. In 1968 Moore explained his preference for plaster when creating a sculpture to be cast in bronze:

Moon Head was cast in an edition nine plus one the artist’s copy at the Noack Foundry in West Berlin, and the sculpture is marked with the foundry’s stamp (fig.7). It is not known for certain whether the whole edition was cast at once or over a period of years. During the 1960s Moore used a number of different foundries depending on the size of the sculpture and how quickly a cast was required. In 1967 Moore stated, ‘I use the Noack foundry for casting most of my work because in my opinion, Noack is the best bronze founder I know ... Also, the Noack foundry is reliable in all ways – in keeping to dates of delivery – and in sustaining the quality of their work’.3 This sculpture was probably made using the sand casting technique, although the finely polished surfaces provide little definitive evidence of the casting methods used.

According to records held at the Henry Moore Foundation, the base of this sculpture was cast separately at the Art Bronze Foundry in London. Moore often chose to have the bases of his sculptures – which were usually less complex in form – cast at smaller foundries in London. Tate’s sculpture is signed and inscribed with the edition number ‘Moore 0/9’ on the side of the base, indicating that this was the artist’s copy (fig.8).

After it was cast the bronze sculpture was probably returned to Moore so that he could check the quality of the cast, apply a patina, and mount the two parts onto the base. A patina is the surface colour of a sculpture and is usually achieved by applying chemical solutions to the pre-heated bronze surface. Tate’s sculpture has a speckled appearance, created by spraying or flicking the chemical patina solution onto the bronze from a stiff brush, and features contrasting dark brown and lighter, copper-coloured areas (fig.9). It is likely that the darker patina was rubbed back at the edges and convex points to allow the lighter tones to shine through. In order to prevent the lighter tones from oxidising and changing colour, a coat of protective lacquer was applied to the surface. Publicly, Moore always maintained that he patinated his works himself, and rarely acknowledged that this work was more often undertaken by his assistants. In 1988 the sculptor Richard Wentworth recalled the time he spent working for Moore in the summer of 1967, noting that having ‘passed the test’ of washing a large sculpture without leaving drip marks, he ‘was set to using metal polish on Moon Head’.4 It is not known whether Wentworth polished Tate’s version of the sculpture, but his recollections give an insight into what kind of finishing work was undertaken at Moore’s studio and how tasks were allocated.

It is notable that Tate’s example of Moon Head has a very different patina to that usually described in relation to this work. Discussing Moon Head in 1968 Moore stated:

Since Tate’s example was originally the artist’s copy, it can be reasonably assumed that Moore was satisfied with its patina, and that it was not his intention to colour every cast in the edition in the same way.6 Nevertheless, the reproduction of the example with the golden finish in major publications such as Henry Moore: A Study of his Life and Work (1965) by the critic Herbert Read, and the widespread citation of his 1968 statement about Moon Head,have informed subsequent critical discussions of the sculpture.7

Another example of Moon Head is held in the Singapore Art Museum (donated by the Sarah Lee Corporation). The remaining casts are believed to be in private collections. The original full-size plaster version is held in the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, while the Henry Moore Foundation owns a porcelain version of Moon Head, which was cast in an edition of six plus one artist’s copy in 1964 (fig.11).

In 1968 the curator and critic David Sylvester identified Moon Head as belonging to a group of sculptures made by Moore in the early 1960s that demonstrated a preoccupation with thin, flat, sharp-edged forms.8 Working Model for Knife Edge Two Piece 1962 (Tate T00603; fig.12), for example, comprises two thin, loosely rectangular forms positioned in parallel with one another, which, according to Moore, have ‘a kind of sliding relationship, like two sliding doors’.9 In this earlier work Moore was particularly interested in exploring the formal relationship between thinness and broadness, believing that ‘sculpture has some disadvantages compared with painting, but it can have one great advantage over painting – that it can be looked at from all round; and if this attitude is used and fully exploited then it can give to sculpture a continual, changing, never-ending surprise and interest’.10 The two-part design of Moon Head and the interstitial space established between the two thin forms (fig.13) bear comparison with Working Model for Knife Edge Two Piece. In the same way that the two forms of the earlier sculpture appear to slide past each other when viewed in the round, Sylvester noted that ‘the highly polished bronze’ of Moon Head ‘gives rise, as one looks from the side through the gap between the discs, to a rippling effect in the facing inner surfaces, a ripple as of water which makes the blades seem altogether fluid, so that one feels that here too one is invited to penetrate the space’.11

Although he never admitted to being influenced by the work of his contemporary Barbara Hepworth, Moore’s decision to place the two component parts of Moon Head in parallel with one another is, according to the curator Alan Wilkinson, reminiscent of Hepworth’s Disks in Echelon 1935 (Tate T03132; fig.14).12 In this sculpture, which was originally carved in wood, Hepworth positioned two vertically orientated discs ‘in echelon’, a term that refers to two parallel components where one is in advance of the other. Hepworth’s presentation of sculptural forms in echelon became a recurring compositional motif in her work, and Moore would certainly have been familiar with it.

Despite the clear formal affinities between his work and Hepworth’s, Moore chose to highlight the influence of natural materials and ancient Cycladic art in discussions of Moon Head. In 1969 he wrote:

Moore first encountered examples of Cycladic figurines in the British Museum while he was a student in London in the 1920s. His reflections on Moon Head were made in a letter dated June 1969, written to Lord Eccles, Chairman of the Trustees of the British Museum, in response to an invitation to exhibit examples of his work alongside the museum’s collection of ancient Cycladic carvings. Moore’s early interest in Cycladic art may be aligned with the broader artistic tendency known as ‘primitivism’. This over-arching term is used by art historians to describe a propensity of early twentieth-century European modern art to emulate the forms and perceived values of non-Western art, as well as prehistoric and medieval European art. Moore’s interest in so-called ‘primitive’ art dated from his time as a student at Leeds School of Art, where, in 1920, he read the art critic Roger Fry’s influential book Vision and Design (1920), which included chapters on African, Islamic and ancient American arts. In 1947 Moore recalled that ‘Fry opened the way to other books and to the realisation of the British Museum. That was the beginning really ... One room after another in the British Museum took my enthusiasm’.14 Moore admired the ancient marble figurines for their simplified bodily forms and for their emotive power, remarking to Eccles: ‘I love + admire Cycladic sculpture. It has such great elemental simplicity ... The Cycladic marble vases are remarkable inventions, seen just as sculpture in themselves – + the thinness, looked at from the side, of the standing idol figures, adds to their incredible sensitivity.’15

In October 1969 a porcelain version of Moon Head was exhibited in the newly opened Greek and Roman galleries in the British Museum. In an editorial published in the journal Apollo, the critic Denys Sutton applauded the museum’s new display but cautioned that:

In 1984 Tate’s cast of Moon Head was included in the exhibition Primitivism in Twentieth Century Art: Affinity of the Tribal and the Modern at the Museum of Modern Art, New York (MoMA). In this exhibition Moore’s sculpture was presented as an example of Western primitivism alongside works by Constantin Brancusi, Paul Gauguin and Pablo Picasso, among others. In the exhibition catalogue Alan Wilkinson asserted that any formal affinities between Moon Head and the Cycladic figurines identified by Moore were purely coincidental. He revealed instead that William Fagg, a leading scholar on African art, had told him that ‘the exact source for the hand-shaped form ... was a Mama mask of a buffalo from Nigeria, which is illustrated in Fagg’s 1963 book, Nigerian Images’ (fig.16).17 Moore had been given a copy of Fagg’s book shortly after its publication by the art dealer Harry Fischer, and Wilkinson asserted that Moore ‘transformed the symmetrical Mama mask into something resembling an abstract horned head or giant asymmetrical hand’.18 He concluded that the sculpture ‘would appear to be the last Moore sculpture to have been inspired by tribal art’.19 However, in 2006 Wilkinson recanted his earlier assertion, acknowledging that ‘I had failed ... to take into account the 1962 Maquette for Head and Hand, on which it was based, made a year before Fagg’s book was published’.20 Wilkinson went on to ponder, ‘did Fagg have another African mask in mind, or were the affinities between the 1964 Moon Head and the Mama Mask of a Buffalo so strong that he convinced himself that Moore must have been inspired by the African carving?’21 Wilkinson concluded that the numerous possible sources for, and varied associations prompted by Moon Head ‘attests to the evocative resonance of Moore’s art’.22

Moon Head was presented by Henry Moore to the Tate Gallery in 1978 as part of the Henry Moore Gift. The Gift comprised thirty-six sculptures in bronze, marble and plaster and was exhibited in its entirety alongside Tate’s existing collection of Moore’s work in an exhibition celebrating the artist’s eightieth birthday, which opened in June 1978. A press release was duly prepared announcing that ‘The group [of sculptures] is the most substantial gift of works ever given to the Tate by an artist during his lifetime’.23 Moon Head was exhibited in gallery eighteen alongside Working Model for Three Way Piece No.1: Points 1964 (Tate T02298) and Working Model for Three Way Piece No.2: Archer 1964 (Tate T02299) (fig.17). At its close in late August the Director of Tate, Norman Reid, reflected in a letter to Moore’s daughter Mary Danowski that although he was sad to see the exhibition come to an end ‘we have the consolation of the splendid group of sculptures which Henry has presented to the nation’.24