Page 20 - Studio International - March 1965

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tural forms with which he expresses it. His gentle, un­
disturbed and undisturbing art embodies and reflects
the graceful simplicity of our landscape. His is a
message of calm and acceptance. a neutral non­
belligerence. His idols tell us that nature is kind and
gentle. and also grand and aloof. It is an intimate God,
friendly and revealing, yet at the same time mysterious
and remote. But always comforting.
One needs to look back over the European sculptural
tradition to appreciate how unique is Moore's achieve­
ment. From the Greeks onward, and from Michelangelo
to Rodin. and beyond, sculpture has been dynamic.
thrusting, disturbing, energetic. One needs to go to the
oriental arts to find an equal to Moore's powerful
resignation. And how perfectly he mirrors the English
landscape and character.
Moore's art is humanistic in the tradition of the English
19th century, not a revolutionary gesture. The human
form remains of deep and moving significance to him
and the miracle is that from so hackneyed a theme he is
still able to devise original. meaningful variations. In so
far as his art contains no expression of despair, anger.
disruption. disapproval. it is curiously aloof and out of
tune with the times. This remoteness. this self-contained
ethic, is part of Moore's Englishness-or Yorkshireness.
When it comes to the rest of English sculpture, there is
difficulty in objective judgement since it has been so
vastly overpraised, and overplayed by our state
propaganda machine. Moore is both the glory and
curse of our sculpture because with his immense
success and reputation he has misled the public and
younger artists into an assumption that a highly
personal solution could be widely imitated and
exploited. What the obituarist in the New Statesman
wrote of T. S. Eliot applies to Moore in another art
form: 'If his poetry has been massively influential. it
has-like that of all major poets-been found to be
no use whatsoever as a model for the aspiring
poet.' At the same time. with so important a figure
in our midst, we have neglected other major sculptors
and movements of our time. The same arrogance which
caused us for centuries to despise and distrust the
foreigner. still acts to exclude artistic achievements from
abroad. It takes years before an important foreign artist
is afforded hospitality here. unless he takes up resi­
dence. although the case of Kokoschka belies even this.
The Whitechapel Art Gallery, with outside help, has
managed to introduce leading American artists to Lon­
don, but many Europeans of equal and greater signifi­
cance are hardly known.
This xenophobia leads to chauvinism and exaggera­
tion of national qualities. It is not coincidental that
Epstein and Gaudier-Brzeska. the two finest pre-Moore
sculptors in England, had no influence. Their tempera­
ments were so alien that they could not be accepted,
let alone assimilated. One cannot imagine the equiva­
lent of an Ecole de Paris in London; foreign artists are
never really welcomed. and as in the case of Epstein
are even persecuted for their difference.
Moore, because of his real achievement, and also
because of the ignorance of other major achievements
abroad. has wielded enormous influence. Just how
great one became aware at the last Open-air Sculpture
Exhibition at Battersea Park in 1963. Grouped round
Moore's Standing Figure, a typically heroic. majestic
form. anthropoid yet pantheistic. were the works of
what might be termed the English Humanistic School.
There was one of Kenneth Armitage's playful conceits
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