150 RES 17/10 SPRING/AUTUMN 89 Figure 3. Moote, Mother and Child, 1922 (LH 3}. (All LH numbers refer to Henry Moore catalogue raisonné.)Henry Moore and pre-Columbian art BARBARA BRAUN ‘Among the many ron-Westem influences that Henry ‘Moore assimilated, pre-Columbian sculpture stands out 2s seminal, Mocre is also the modern artist most closely identified with it, having often extolled its “stoniness, truth to material and full three-cimersional conception ‘of form.” Although the comparison betweon his 1929, and 1930 Reclining Figures and the Toltec- Maya Chacmool is familiar, his persistent reference to pre- Columbian artis less well known. He first encountered itas a student in a provincial at school, almost immediately began using it as a model for his work, and continued to refer to it in every phase of his long and illustrious career as Brain's, and then the Westeen world’, premier modernist sculptor and monument maker, Today we can see that he used this alien tradition, especially highland Mexican plastic formulae, to popularize still another—madernism — which is defined here as the notion of aristic progress through formal and technical innovation infocmed by styles of the past (G00 Glaves-Smith 1981: 74-75). Moore emerged as a sculptor in the eatly 1920s at a time when the devastation of World War | and the ‘ruption of the Russian Revolution had shattered the coherency of established sculptural tadition. In England, the pre-war experimentation of Jacob Epstein, Henry Gaudier Brzeska, and Constantin Brancusi had become available as a model for a new kind of sculpture. Fethaps even more important was a new theoretical basis for the modern practice of sculpture, articulated by Bloomsbury critics Roger Fry (Vision and Design, 1920) and Clive Bell (Art, 1914). Both these books were reprinted many times throughout the 1920s (Harrison 1981: 103), Fry's book — with its chapters on African, Ancient ‘American, Bushman, and Mohammedan art, alongside those on Giotto, Cézanne, and Renoir —asserted that atall over the world could be scanned for authentic ‘esthetic experience, and thatthe classical Western at tradition was imbued with the conservativism of authority. Bell's concept of “significant form,” stressing the autonomy and disinterestedness of art, reinforced this view by admitting a whole cange of experiences into its practice—not only primitive, non-Wesern models, but also, say, a devotion to the memory of a Yorkshire landscape, an interest in the shapes of stones and bones, departures from anatomical accuracy, and finally, abstraction (Harrison 1981: 104). Here were the basic precepts for modemist sculpture: 2 commitment to the unity ofall aesthetic experience, the notion— advanced by Bell—that a work of art need only have sculptural meaning, and permission to range all over the world’s sculpture in search of models, as Epstein, Gaudier Breeska, and Brancusi had done. Moore, too, embraced these tenets at the outset of his career, having discovered Fry’s Vision and Design ‘while he was attending Leeds School of Art (/919- 1921), “Once you'd read Roger Fry the whole thing was there.” he declared, adding, “Fry opened the way to other books and to the realization of the British Museum” (Russell 1973: 23). It was all quite straightforward, he said. Even his working class origins meshed perfectly with modernism’s implicit ‘oppositional stance." ‘Asa scholarship student at the Royal College of Art, Moore accommodated to the demands of the very traditional coursework, such a5 modeling figures after casts, but pursued his real education elsewhere, in his search for altematives to the classical humanist 1. He was born in 1898, seventh of elgh chide, in Casteord, 2 yim Nonth of England industral town just outside Lee, and ase in an environment dominated by coal ines. chemical plants, znd otters, His coal miner father was a forceal and ambtious man teh socialist convictions and inelecial interests, who managed (by Ait of scholarships to sed thee of fe chil, including Hear, #2 Castor Secondary School —intended forthe chide ofthe petit bourgeoisie —so that they could beter themselves by becoming schooteaches. Moore favored his getler mathe, who encouraged bis atc inclination, which were ther enforced by his high school aft teacher: Mins Alice Costick tok Kim under ber wing until he ented inthe army (1917), and saat it that he stucled sculpture fa veteran’ grain aidupee is ream ‘Asan oder and more disciplined student, Moore lorshed at Leeds Schoo oF Ar, becoming he soe beneficiary of ts pew sculpture department academically ox of favor rt ths time), Ad ciety preprng for hs wet carer move, a scholashis at London's Roya Collegeof At. At Laeds fe connected with Sie Michal Sadler shen vie chancllor ofthe Leede Univerty, the Gre of many prominent. progessive cognoscent who became his elo, palrorn_—in the ay yer, proving appotunte for advancement land deflecting hose critcism, and ws ater years, prmeting him ‘o national prominence. Asan avid modern art entusiag, Sadler colleced paintings by Tumer, Constable, Cézanne van Gogh, Gauguin, Picasso, and Kandinsky, beftended important ass the Malle, and even eanslated Kandisky’s Ar of Sptual Harmony 1914, nce More was ensconced at the Royal College of A, its newly appointed pancipal (ater Sit) Wiliam Rethensein who had kaown Degas, Monet, and Rodi in Pars), became Moore's champion He160._RES 17/18 SPRINGIAUTUMN 89 tradition. “There was a period when | tried to avoid looking at Greek sculpture of any kind,” he later recalled. “When | thought that the Greek and Renaissance were the enemy, and that one had to throw all that over and stat again from the beginning of primitive an.”* Reading Fry had led Moore directly to the British Museum, a vast repository of centuries of colonial plunder, to find what he was looking for. Immediately, he began a dedicated study of archaic Greek, Egyptian, Cycladic, Austral isiands, African, Sumerian, and, particularly, Mexican art on regular biweetly visits, “One room after another in the British ‘Museum took my enthusiasm . .. a new world at every turn, ... And ater the first excitement it was the art of ancient Mexico that spoke to me most, except perhaps? Romanesque or early Norman. And | admit clearly and frankly that early Mexican art formed my views of carving as much as anything | could do” James. 1966: 33). ‘Ancient Mexican art was especially well represented in the British Museum, which had acquired is first pieces in the 1820s and gradually augmented its collection throughout the nineteenth century — depending mainly on the generosity of colonial officials, travelers, and explorers who brought curiosities home.’ The most notable pre-Columbian [5a Mowe an appovniment at teacher 3 the college (1925-1929), fd his both, Chases Ruhersten, began colecting Moose’s “ule as erly a¢ 1922, Anothor meetr ofthis patio was Badlord printer and publisher EC. Gregory, who, beginning inthe late 1940s, published the fv. volume calalogve asonée ef Mooe's work which is known as Lund-Humphries. By the md-1950s, ‘Gregory, Moor, and Herbert Red Were siting on the same ‘emits ofthe Instute f Contemporary AP, promoting public ‘clpture. Thus, fom the srt, Moore's couse was remarhably “srooth, combining exceptional len’, exraotinary dedication, and feat good luck. From humble beginning in the Yoshie working hss, he move swift to embrace new ideasand eablishment lenefacios in his steady climb to succes. "Fram an interview with More, Hoicon, vol. 3, 0.2 (1960), 2 Among the ealestacquisitons were Aze cavings that had been in the provocative 1825 Mexican exhibition stage by Willan Bullck m London's Cgypian Hal, Piccaily. This rst European view of linge ale Arte sup incladed eae of uch major ‘monuments 95 the Calenda Stone fount in 1790 under the Meco Cy Cathedral Stone of Toe, ad the tering Ceatlicue, which Bullock had taken during his Mesican travels, alongside botanical specimens, stufed birds, ad ancient and modern artifacts. The Calletien was piven further impetus bythe publication of Lod Kingsborough’ lavish ninevolume encyclopedia, Antiquities of ‘Mexico 1851-1848)—-for which he hai commissioned copies oll the Mexican cadicesin Eure, in hopes of proving hat Mexico had Deen cotonizes by the lost mbes of el, See Homer, p. 178, accessions were items collected by ethnologist Henry Christy during his Mexican travels in 1856~1857 During the frst three decades of the twentieth century, Thomas Athol Joyce was the key figure in shaping and disseminating information about the British ‘Museum's American Antiquities collection.* in 1923 Joyce transferred eminent Maya epigrapher Alfred P. Maudslay's extraordinary collection of ancient Maya sculptures and casts from the basement of the Vicioria and Albert Museum to the British Museum (which had originally declined to take it in 1893). He set it up with great fanfare in a “Maudslay Room” — the first time the museum had ever devoted an entire room to the activity ofa living person—and prepared for the ‘occasion a Guide to the Maudslay Collection of Maya Sculptures from Central America (1923), Joyce's own archaeological excavations in British Honduras (1926~ 1931) ané additional major purchases filled out the Maya collection, at the same time as the British Museum was acquiring extensive holdings of South ‘American material, especially Peruvian pottery (Braunhotiz 1970: 43-44) Even though mary more of ts specimens were in storage than on exhibit—then as now—the museurn’s ethnographic display still contained, in Moore's words, an “inexhaustible wealth and variety of sculptural ‘achievement (Negro, Oceanic Islards, and North and South Americal, but overcrowded and jumbled together Uike junk in_a marine stor, so that after hundreds of Visits | would sill find carvings not discovered there before’ James 1966: 157).5 Outside the precincts of the British Museum, there ‘was an equally intensive flurry of professional activity 4. Appointed curator inthe ethoographic depanment in 1992, Joyce nad by 1905 reinstaled the colection. His Short Guide the ‘Amercam Antiques in the Brish Maseun (19121 was followed by ‘Sever excelent wollicul plications basa on 2 cat index of Some 30,000 museum specimens, including South American Archeology (942), Mesican Archaeology $914) Cantal Arican land West Indian Archaeology (1916), and Naya and Mexican At {7927|—all mainly lusate with Batch Nceum mater, See | Braucholt, 9. 42. Urder Joyce's editorship, Man, journal ofthe Royal Antropologcal festtute, ako became a quisofcial oman ofthe ‘museum's ehnogranhic department. oyce ako wrote inrodutions to the catalogue ofthe Burlngton Fine Arts Clubs 1920 “Exhibition of ‘Objects of tedigenous American An” —an extensive display of ancient American object from local paiva colleions and an ilysated edition of Prescot’ popular Conquest of Mexico (152). 5; The pre-Columbian material visible to Moor can be gleaned from 2 perusal of fyee's various publication and ther plates, as wel 25 fom the at5wn FecollecDOns and awn.