Henri Gaudier-Brzeska (1891–1915) gained notoriety at a young age when he moved to Britain in 1908 and entered into the group of artists, poets and writers including Ezra Pound, Wyndham Lewis and T. E. Hulme, who were leading figures of the Vorticist group (Gaudier contributed to the two issues of their magazine Blast). He was also a proponent of direct carving following the example of Jacob Epstein. Gaudier was killed in action during World War I in Belgium.

Though his career was cut short at a young age, Gaudier-Brzeska’s influence on both British and French modernist sculpture was surprisingly strong. His work can be seen at the Tate Gallery in London, Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge, the Musée National d’Art Moderne in Paris and the Musée des Beaux-Arts d’Orléans.