13.4 x 13 x 7 cm
Willoughby Gerrish’s new exhibition Shaping the Figure, presents seven important figurative sculptures: Balzac, (Etude Type C Torse) by Auguste Rodin, Femme Assise Dans un Fauteuil by Jacques Lipchitz, Family Group and Recumbent Figure by Henry Moore, Sitting Couple by Lynn Chadwick and Arco Iris Cloud Head and Macauba Torso I by Emily Young. Analysing this collection helps us to explore the relationship between these hugely influential sculptors and the human form.
Henry Moore fundamentally believed that ‘long and intense study of the human figure is the necessary foundation for a sculptor. The human figure is most complex and subtle and difficult to grasp in form and construction, and so it makes the most exacting form for study and comprehension.’ Moore’s obsessive study of the human body is similar to Rodin’s who was prolific in the creation of figures and fragments of body parts when he was working on a new sculpture. The bust of Honoré de Balzac presented in this exhibition is in itself a model for the final work, Monument to Balzac, Rodin created a nude version of Balzac’s form so he could ’understand how fabric should disclose the contours of the underlying body.’ Despite this meticulous attention to detail the sculpture was deemed to be a catastrophic failure by the audience who rejected his naturalistic style as a ‘crude sketch’ and stated that his monument lacked any physical resemblance to the writer. Rodin defended his work stating,
‘One can find errors in my Balzac; the artist does not always attain his dream; but I believe in the truth of my principle; and Balzac, rejected or not, is nonetheless in the line of demarcation between commercial sculpture and the art of sculpture that we no longer have in Europe. My principle is to imitate not only form but also life. I search in nature for this life and amplify it by exaggerating the hollows and lumps’
Though his research into Balzac’s appearance was precise the final sculpture was more of an embodiment of his character and written persona rather than a model of his physical form, he explained that he wanted the monument to express, ‘his intense labor, of the difficulty of his life, of his incessant battles and of his great courage.’
Femme Assise Dans un Fauteuil by Jacques Lipchitz, though a different language to Rodin’s Balzac, shares a similar quality in that both artists have placed a higher importance on the essence of humanity rather than accurately depicting the physical form. Art historian Albert Elsen notes in The Humanism of Rodin and Lipchitz that:
‘the human form remains for Lipchitz as it did for Rodin the basic vehicle for the interpretation of all significant human experience both artists appear to be traditional by comparison with the non-naturalistic sculpture of our time. Both have encouraged others to study nature and have avowed that it is the main source of their inspiration. Their concept of nature, however, includes not only the visible world, but also the internal world of feelings and passions.’
Here Elsen identifies another theme that is often present within figurative sculpture, this is the relationship between humanity and the natural world. Henry Moore and Emily Young have both explored this subject thoroughly within their sculpture, Young is especially preoccupied with this relationship, she explains that ‘the hand carved stone sculptures are a hand held out to the future, acknowledging the stony past, and trying to connect somehow from a broken human present’.
Moore’s Recumbent Figure connects to the land in a more conspicuous way by mirroring the undulating landscape of the British Isles in the curves and mounds of the figure, with caves and tunnels isolating and at the same time linking the parts of the body.
The second Henry Moore sculpture presented is Family Group. The theme of the family was explored by Moore continuously between 1944 and the early 1950s. In this period, he also filled nearly two sketchbooks with drawings presenting family members in different poses, which he realised as maquettes before settling on a design to be made into four monumental sculptures. The conception of this sculpture lies in the 1930s, when the German architect Walter Gropius proposed to Moore that he make a large-scale sculpture for his progressive school. Instead of just building a school, Gropius was going to make a centre for the whole life of the surrounding villages, and Family Group would represent the centre of it, the family as the basic unit.
The couple is a theme which Lynn Chadwick explored thoroughly throughout his career, the earliest depiction being Two Dancing Figures produced in 1954. Perhaps Chadwick's fascination and proclivity for sculpting couples was due to the turmoil happening within his own relationships. Though Chadwick’s Sitting Figures are recognisable as male and female from their forms, they have the iconic square and triangular heads which gives the viewer a definitive answer, Dennis Farr explains this as a ‘new formal symbol for the female and male head, his female figures now had diamond of triangular-shaped heads, his males square or rectangular heads’. Despite this abstracted and dehumanising feature, ‘throughout his work, even at its most abstract and geometric, there is usually an allusion to natural forms that underpins and gives vitality to it’
Arco Iris Cloud Head and Macauba Torso I by Emily Young mirror the natural world. Macauba stone is known for its striking blue colouring, which when paired with the flowing lines of Young’s torso produces an oceanic quality. Young is the granddaughter of sculptor Kathleen Scott, a colleague of Auguste Rodin, Scott has been described as 'the most significant and prolific British woman sculptor before Barbara Hepworth', she was a huge influence on Young, who is described as ‘Britain's greatest living stone sculptor’.
Young’s sculpture not only communicates with the landscape but also the future generations, she states that ‘the heads, discs and torsos I make now will carry the message that some of us were peace loving people, capable of deep thought and profound compassion and connectedness with all life on earth. It’s a silent howl into the future’.
This exhibition is appointment only, please email Catherine Duck:
admin@willoughbygerrish.com to arrange a viewing.