Ideas for Sculpture
Maker
Henry Moore
(British, 1898–1986)
Date1936
MediumPencil, charcoal, and pen and brush and ink on wove paper
DimensionsSheet: 14-7/16 x 21-13/16 in. (36.7 x 55.4 cm)
Credit LineThe Joel Starrels, Jr. Memorial Collection
Object number1974.267
Object TypeDrawings
On View
Not on viewThe year of this drawing, 1936, marks Henry Moore’s participation in the International Surrealist Exhibition held in London. The four large shapes of this large black-and-white study of a reclining female figure are closely related to the biomorphic Surrealist forms of Jean (Hans) Arp or Joan Miró.
The freely drawn doodles and other linear marks at the top of the composition may even originate in the Surrealist concept of tapping the unconscious and the practice of automatic drawing. They appear as a visualization of a working method practiced by Moore, in which, as the sculptor later wrote, he would begin a drawing "with no preconceived problem to solve, with only the desire to use pencil on paper, and make lines, tones, and shapes with no conscious aim; but as my mind takes in what is so produced, a point arrives where some idea becomes conscious and crystallizes, and then a control and ordering begins to take place."
The freely drawn doodles and other linear marks at the top of the composition may even originate in the Surrealist concept of tapping the unconscious and the practice of automatic drawing. They appear as a visualization of a working method practiced by Moore, in which, as the sculptor later wrote, he would begin a drawing "with no preconceived problem to solve, with only the desire to use pencil on paper, and make lines, tones, and shapes with no conscious aim; but as my mind takes in what is so produced, a point arrives where some idea becomes conscious and crystallizes, and then a control and ordering begins to take place."
Henry Moore
circa 1939 (misdated later by the artist 1942) (recto); circa 1939 and/or 1958 (verso)
