Two monumental bronze sculptures by the English artist Henry Moore are currently installed in two symbolic locations in the city of Florence: Piazza della Signoria and the churchyard of the Abbey of San Miniato al Monte. They are respectively Large Interior Form (1953-1954) and Family Group (1948-1949).
The exhibition, Henry Moore in Florence, curated by Sebastiano Barassi, Head of Collections and Programmes of the Henry Moore Foundation, and Sergio Risaliti, Director of the Museo Novecento in the Tuscan chief town, is on view until March 2023 and emphasises the special connection that the great English master had with Italy and with Tuscany in particular throughout his career - from his first travelling scholarship in 1924-1925 to his summer stays in Forte dei Marmi. A connection that led - as the Henry Moore Foundation reports - to the most significant solo exhibition of Moore's lifetime: his show at Forte Belvedere of Florence in 1972 with over two thousand people attending the opening, and more than three hundred thousand people visiting the event over its run.
Henry Moore always paid great attention to the masters of Italian art, Giotto (Giotto's paintings is the finest sculpture I met in Italy - he wrote in 1924 when still strong was on him the influence of ancient and primitive art), Masaccio and Michelangelo.
Henry Moore's friend and art critic Roberto Sanesi recalled during a visit to the artist's home and Studio in the Hertfordshire countryside in December 1971, a large book on Michelangelo's work opened on the yellow sofa in the living room, "to study the terraces of Forte Belvedere", as the artist told him.
Sanesi himself wrote a few years later: 'I believe Michelangelo is credited with the conviction that a sculpture, if perfect, should be rolled down a hill without any of its parts, any of its projections, breaking. If it is not by Michelangelo, however it suits him as it suits Moore. It is a way of signifying that the space around the sculpture, the space by which the sculpture is embraced, shaped, is part of it, and a somewhat concrete part of it'.
Henry Moore. Large Interior Form, 1953-1954. Photo Credit: Serge Domingie
Henry Moore. Family Group, 1948-1949. Photo Credit: Serge Domingie
Henry Moore. Family Group, 1948-1949. Photo Credit: Serge Domingie
Henry Moore. Family Group, 1948-1949. Photo Credit: Serge Domingie
Henry Moore. Forte Belvedere 1972. Photo credit: Carlo Bacci
Henry Moore. Forte Belvedere 1972. Photo credit: Carlo Bacci
Henry Moore. Forte Belvedere 1972. Photo credit: Alberta Pezzele
Henry Moore. Forte Belvedere 1972. Photo credit: Silvano Giannini
Henry Moore. Forte Belvedere 1972. Photo credit: Alessandro Carraresi
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