Henry Moore, O.M., C.H. (1898-1986)

Seated Family Group has recently come to light in a private American collection and is a previously unrecorded drawing dating to 1944. This touching scene depicts the family unit of the mother and father holding a young child, with another child seated at their feet, reading, and a similar composition can be found in several of Moore's drawings and sculptures from this time.

During the early 1940s, Moore ceased to produce sculpture, instead concentrating on drawing, most notably of Londoners sheltering in the underground during the air raids. Through these scenes of human desolation Moore depicted the security and solidarity that his figures sought in one another. This sense of compassion inspired his next large commission by the Church of St Matthew, Northampton, in 1943. Madonna and Child was the first sculpture he had worked on since 1940, and the tenderness apparent in his portrayal of the relationship between mother and child was likely to have reflected his own wishes to have children. Such an evocative emotion can be found in the present work, dating to the following year.