What to see this week
Becoming Henry Moore is at Henry Moore Studios & Gardens, Perry Green, Much Hadham, Hertfordshire, until October 22 (01279 843333; www.henry-moore.org) Celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Henry Moore Foundation, this is the first exhibition to look at Moore’s early years as an artist and includes his first ever commissions, as well as works by sculptors such as Picasso, Epstein, Brâncusi and Rodin, who had a formative influence on his development from 1914 to 1930. The show also marks the unveiling of a new visitor centre and archive at the redeveloped studio and gardens of Perry Green, on the site of Moore’s former studio.
George Rickey: Sculpture from the Estate
is at Marlborough Fine Art, 6, Albemarle Street, London W1, April 21–May 20 (020–7629 5161; www.marlboroughlondon.com) Sixteen pieces by George Rickey (1907–2002), who pioneered kinetic sculpture with Alexander Calder in the 1950s. Although best known for his monumental outdoor works, he also made these smaller indoor sculptures—mostly of steel, sometimes with applied paint—that will astonish for the beauty of their movement and balance. The accompanying catalogue includes an essay by Rickey.
Diarmuid Kelley: Akzidenz-grotesk is at Offer Waterman, 17, St George Street, London W1, April 21–May 16 (www.waterman.co.uk; 020–7042 323) New works—studies of figures, interiors and still-lifes—by the celebrated portraitist, whose fascination with the theatrical qualities of painting is shown in the way he orchestrates the ‘stage’ and lighting of his compositions and imbues even an assemblage of ephemeral objects with the hint of a narrative.
Lucian Freud: Early Works This new display, on show at Pallant House Gallery, Chichester until October 1 (01243 774557; www.pallant.org.uk), focuses on a small selection of Freud’s early works dating from the late 1930s and early 1940s. Centring around three new long-term loans to the gallery—including Portrait of a Girl (1950), right—they reveal some of the themes that would preoccupy the artist through his life, such as a fascination with painting portraits of family and friends—‘i would sit very close and stare. It could be uncomfortable for both of us,’ he said—and the symbolic use of everyday and botanical objects. The selection shows Freud working in a range of materials during these formative years.