This work dates from Henry's Moore's time as an official war artist in the Second World War.

During this period he produced some of his most powerful and moving drawings. After he had completed the Shelter drawings of 1941, studies of Londoners taking refuge from the Blitz in the underground, he visited the Wheldale Colliery in his home town of Castleford in West Yorkshire, where he recorded the miners at work. Mining was a reserved occupation during wartime and Moore was himself the son of a miner.

Provenance

Roland, Browse & Delbanco, London; Galerie Kroller, Zurich; Galerie Patrick Cramer, Geneva; Quintana Fine Art, New York; private collection (acquired circa 1985); Sotheby's, London.


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