Bronze
48 ¼ x 90 ¼ x 61 ¾ inches
COURTESY OF THE RAYMOND AND PATSY NASHER COLLECTION
NASHER SCULPTURE CENTER, DALLAS, TX
Artist Henry Moore is regarded as one of the most important British sculptors of the 20th century. Moore’s work was heavily influenced by non-Western art. This particular sculpture, Reclining Figure: Angles, reflects the impact ancient Mexican art had on him as a student. In the 1920s, Moore encountered a plaster cast of an Aztec Chacmool stone carving in a museum in Paris. He would later say that this recumbent figure was incredibly influential to his work.
Made over fifty years after Moore’s defining experience with the Chacmool piece, Reclining Figure: Angles still recalls the carving in its sharply angled head, flange of hair, and alert gaze. The soft, rounded curves of the form evoke a rolling, mountainous landscape, suggesting fertility and the universal connection between Woman and Nature. Made late in Moore’s life, Reclining Figure: Angles represents one of the artist’s more naturalistic statements, retaining a strong sense of the human form while incorporating curving lines with sharp angles that together comprise a lithesome figure that is simplified and fluid.
