Henry Moore Artwork Catalogue
Reclining Figures and Lyre Birds
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Reclining Figures and Lyre Birds
Sketchbook
- Page [22] from Sketchbook with Square Forms and Lyre Birds
Date1936, c.1938, 1942
Artwork TypeDrawing
Catalogue NumberHMF 1296
Date Order NumberAG 36-72.20
Papertextured off-white medium-weight wove
Dimensionspaper: 250 x 178 mm
Signature
unsigned, undated
Inscription
pencil u.c.l. The lyre bird
OwnershipThe Henry Moore Foundation: gift of the artist 1977
Collections
Moore seems to have drawn on this page on three separate occasions. At the top of the page, hidden beneath the 1942 sketches of lyre birds, are drawings of ideas for sculptures, compatible with others of 1936. Below these are rows of reclining figures probably drawn in the early months of 1938. Moore superimposed the lyre birds on these sketches, drawing in black chalk and pastel and using a wash over some areas. The bottom half of the page remained blank. He took up the sketchbook again and drew eight ideas for sculpture on the blank half-page plus a small reclining figure between the two lyre birds at upper right. This tiny sketch is quite different from the very abstract subjects of the other drawings beneath the lyre birds.