Henry Moore: Sculptural Process and Public Identity

Moore sent this postcard of a study for the Burgers of Calais by the nineteeth-century French sculptor Rodin to Sir Kenneth and Lady Clark when he visited an open-air museum of sculpture in Antwerp. This was likely to have been Middelheim Park, where in 1953 Moore exhibited a cast of the sculpture King and Queen 1952–3 (Tate T00228) in the Second Biennial for Sculpture.

Rodin was a favourite artist of Moore’s, who later wrote, ‘This is in my opinion the greatness of Rodin, that he could identify himself with and feel so strongly about the human body. He believed it was the basis of all sculpture. He understood the human figure so well and loved it so much that this is the universal quality about him. And out of the body he could make these marvellous sculptural rhythms’ (Rodin Sculpture and Drawings, exhibition catalogue, Hayward Gallery, London 1970).