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拍品專文
Double Standing Figure is a rare and important work within Henry Moore’s extensive oeuvre, focusing on the intriguing pairing of two bronze casts of the same sculptural figure, aligned on a single plinth at approximately ninety degrees to one another. Standing at over seven feet in height, these towering, architectonic forms are constructed through a striking combination of biomorphic and geometric components, the thin, skeletal framework punctuated by flat, angular planes in some sections, and curved, flowing forms in others. While the artist had originally conceived of this figure as a singular form, Standing Figure (LH 290), by coupling two examples of the same form together in the present work Moore creates a dynamic view that shows multiple angles simultaneously, emphasizing its radical conception of the human figure.
The idea for the open, experimental structure of Standing Figure first emerged in a suite of drawings by Moore dated circa 1947-1949, in which he explored a series of different concepts for potential metal, figurative sculptures. The fragmented treatment of these forms shares strong affinities with Pablo Picasso’s drawings published under the title Une anatomie in the first issue of the Surrealist periodical Minotaure in 1933, which Moore most likely saw first-hand upon its arrival in England.
At the same time, aspects of the forms seem to echo the range of organic objets trouvés the artist stored in his studio for use as inspirational jumping-off points, different elements within the sheet recalling the shells, bone fragments, pieces of flint and driftwood that he discovered and collected from the landscape around his home. “There is in Nature a limitless variety of shapes and rhythms from which the sculptor can enlarge his form-knowledge experience,” Moore proclaimed in 1934, noting in particular the “subtle transition of one shape into the next” that could be found in bones (quoted in C. Lichtenstern, Henry Moore: Work, Theory, Impact, London, 2008, p. 53).
Intrigued by the potential of the present form, Moore decided to pursue the idea in three-dimensions, making a small maquette from wire and plasticine, which he then scaled up and translated into plaster, before casting into bronze in 1950. Standing Figure was unveiled to the public for the first time at the Open Air Sculpture exhibition at Battersea Park London in the summer of 1951. Its abstract, surreal reimagining of the figure revealed the radical, experimental shifts that were occurring in Moore’s aesthetic at this time, as his exploration of bronze pushed his vision in bold new directions.
"The construction of the human figure — the tremendous variety of balance, of size, of rhythm — is much more difficult to get right than an animal or a tree… It isn’t just academic training; it really is a deep, strong, fundamental struggle…" - Henry Moore
As Moore later explained, the idea for Double Standing Figure came about when this cast of Standing Figure was returned from exhibition, and positioned in his work space next to a second cast that had recently arrived from the foundry. “Having them both at the studio I was able to try out a double figure arrangement,” he recalled. “For some little time before working on this figure, I was thinking of making four separate figures standing in a row on the same base... But one never finds the time to carry out all one’s plans, and when the two casts of this single figure were together I saw a chance to carry out at least part of the first unrealized conception” (quoted in P. James, Henry Moore on Sculpture, New York, 1967, pp. 108-109).
Following this line of thought, Moore bolted the two figures together on a bronze plate, setting them at contrasting angles to achieve a more dynamic view. “The doubling up of the two figures increased the complexity of the formal relations and intensified the kind of rhythm that the single one had,” Moore explained. “The two figures can’t help having a certain unity since they are in fact the same figure, but in placing them together I made sure that each figure presented a different view from the other whichever way you look at them… this makes it almost impossible I think for a person not knowing they were the same figure, to pick it out” (quoted in ibid., p. 109)
In a letter to the gallerist Curt Valentin from October 1951 discussing this new iteration of Standing Figure, Moore explained his preference for the pairing: “I think the two of them together are more interesting than the single figure and everyone whose opinion I value, who has seen them, thinks the same, and I have decided to keep the two that are here permanently together and to show them as a single work in future. The British Council have asked, and I have agreed, for these two here to be shown in this way at next year’s Biennale” (letter to C. Valentin, 20 October 1951; Curt Valentin Papers, The Museum of Modern Art Archives, New York).
The current cast of the sculpture was created when Andrew Ritchie, then Director of the Painting and Sculpture Department at The Museum of Modern Art in New York, who had seen Double Standing Figure at Moore’s home, requested that an example be included in his upcoming exhibition “Sculpture of the Twentieth Century,” opening at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in October 1952. Moore agreed and organized for another cast of Standing Figure to be made, so that a second figure could be added to the one already in Valentin’s possession. After its inclusion in the exhibition, the sculpture was acquired from Valentin in 1953 by Leon Salter, a painter who went by the pseudonym Zoute and was based in upstate New York.
Double Standing Figure was created in an edition of two—the first, which Moore exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 1952, was sold to Edgar J. Kaufmann Sr. and his wife Liliane, owners of Pittsburgh’s largest department store. A renowned businessman, philanthropist and supporter of the arts, Kaufmann Sr. is perhaps best known for commissioning the architect Frank Lloyd Wright to design a country house for his family in the mountains of south western Pennsylvania in 1935. The resulting vacation home, known as Fallingwater, quickly became an icon of twentieth-century architecture, elegantly blending innovative engineering, visionary aesthetics and the natural beauty of its extraordinary site into a sophisticated home that encapsulates Lloyd Wright’s principles of organic architecture.
According to Valentin’s correspondence with Salter from 1953, the Kaufmanns had purchased Moore’s Double Standing Figure with the intention of displaying it outdoors at Fallingwater—it was later donated to the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar College by Kaufmann’s son, where it remains to this day. The present cast of Double Standing Figure stayed in Salter’s collection until his passing, and was purchased from his estate sale by Johnny and Joanna Carson in 1980.
The idea for the open, experimental structure of Standing Figure first emerged in a suite of drawings by Moore dated circa 1947-1949, in which he explored a series of different concepts for potential metal, figurative sculptures. The fragmented treatment of these forms shares strong affinities with Pablo Picasso’s drawings published under the title Une anatomie in the first issue of the Surrealist periodical Minotaure in 1933, which Moore most likely saw first-hand upon its arrival in England.
At the same time, aspects of the forms seem to echo the range of organic objets trouvés the artist stored in his studio for use as inspirational jumping-off points, different elements within the sheet recalling the shells, bone fragments, pieces of flint and driftwood that he discovered and collected from the landscape around his home. “There is in Nature a limitless variety of shapes and rhythms from which the sculptor can enlarge his form-knowledge experience,” Moore proclaimed in 1934, noting in particular the “subtle transition of one shape into the next” that could be found in bones (quoted in C. Lichtenstern, Henry Moore: Work, Theory, Impact, London, 2008, p. 53).
Intrigued by the potential of the present form, Moore decided to pursue the idea in three-dimensions, making a small maquette from wire and plasticine, which he then scaled up and translated into plaster, before casting into bronze in 1950. Standing Figure was unveiled to the public for the first time at the Open Air Sculpture exhibition at Battersea Park London in the summer of 1951. Its abstract, surreal reimagining of the figure revealed the radical, experimental shifts that were occurring in Moore’s aesthetic at this time, as his exploration of bronze pushed his vision in bold new directions.
"The construction of the human figure — the tremendous variety of balance, of size, of rhythm — is much more difficult to get right than an animal or a tree… It isn’t just academic training; it really is a deep, strong, fundamental struggle…" - Henry Moore
As Moore later explained, the idea for Double Standing Figure came about when this cast of Standing Figure was returned from exhibition, and positioned in his work space next to a second cast that had recently arrived from the foundry. “Having them both at the studio I was able to try out a double figure arrangement,” he recalled. “For some little time before working on this figure, I was thinking of making four separate figures standing in a row on the same base... But one never finds the time to carry out all one’s plans, and when the two casts of this single figure were together I saw a chance to carry out at least part of the first unrealized conception” (quoted in P. James, Henry Moore on Sculpture, New York, 1967, pp. 108-109).
Following this line of thought, Moore bolted the two figures together on a bronze plate, setting them at contrasting angles to achieve a more dynamic view. “The doubling up of the two figures increased the complexity of the formal relations and intensified the kind of rhythm that the single one had,” Moore explained. “The two figures can’t help having a certain unity since they are in fact the same figure, but in placing them together I made sure that each figure presented a different view from the other whichever way you look at them… this makes it almost impossible I think for a person not knowing they were the same figure, to pick it out” (quoted in ibid., p. 109)
In a letter to the gallerist Curt Valentin from October 1951 discussing this new iteration of Standing Figure, Moore explained his preference for the pairing: “I think the two of them together are more interesting than the single figure and everyone whose opinion I value, who has seen them, thinks the same, and I have decided to keep the two that are here permanently together and to show them as a single work in future. The British Council have asked, and I have agreed, for these two here to be shown in this way at next year’s Biennale” (letter to C. Valentin, 20 October 1951; Curt Valentin Papers, The Museum of Modern Art Archives, New York).
The current cast of the sculpture was created when Andrew Ritchie, then Director of the Painting and Sculpture Department at The Museum of Modern Art in New York, who had seen Double Standing Figure at Moore’s home, requested that an example be included in his upcoming exhibition “Sculpture of the Twentieth Century,” opening at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in October 1952. Moore agreed and organized for another cast of Standing Figure to be made, so that a second figure could be added to the one already in Valentin’s possession. After its inclusion in the exhibition, the sculpture was acquired from Valentin in 1953 by Leon Salter, a painter who went by the pseudonym Zoute and was based in upstate New York.
Double Standing Figure was created in an edition of two—the first, which Moore exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 1952, was sold to Edgar J. Kaufmann Sr. and his wife Liliane, owners of Pittsburgh’s largest department store. A renowned businessman, philanthropist and supporter of the arts, Kaufmann Sr. is perhaps best known for commissioning the architect Frank Lloyd Wright to design a country house for his family in the mountains of south western Pennsylvania in 1935. The resulting vacation home, known as Fallingwater, quickly became an icon of twentieth-century architecture, elegantly blending innovative engineering, visionary aesthetics and the natural beauty of its extraordinary site into a sophisticated home that encapsulates Lloyd Wright’s principles of organic architecture.
According to Valentin’s correspondence with Salter from 1953, the Kaufmanns had purchased Moore’s Double Standing Figure with the intention of displaying it outdoors at Fallingwater—it was later donated to the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar College by Kaufmann’s son, where it remains to this day. The present cast of Double Standing Figure stayed in Salter’s collection until his passing, and was purchased from his estate sale by Johnny and Joanna Carson in 1980.