Showing posts with label Madam Tussauds. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Madam Tussauds. Show all posts

Friday, 17 July 2026

MOORE, MOORE, MOORE

 

By 1974, Henry Moore was popular enough to warrant a wax figure in Madam Tussauds, not a bad accolade for a contemporary sculptor whose best work was innovative and experimental. Tussauds resisted the opportunity to do something abstract with his figure, and instead fashioned a fairly good likeness of the 76 year old Yorkshireman, although it did have the somewhat rough-hewn, pock-marked look that wax figures often had at the time. When finished, his nattily dressed facsimile stood alongside Picasso. 























Wax figures are a great interest of mine, particularly because they tell you a lot about the interests and priorities of the society which produces them. They are always ephemeral: they come and then go, usually for good. As such, I don't know whether Moore's figure was still on display when its real life counterpart died in 1986, but I suspect not, David Hockney had almost certainly crept in by then.