Moore/Hepworth - A Collaborative Conference

Call for Papers -

A Collaborative Conference

Henry Moore Institute, Leeds Art Gallery, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, The Hepworth Wakefield and Arts Council Collection based at Longside

Friday 3 June and Saturday 4 June 2011

In Spring 2011 focused attention will be given to the work of Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth in Yorkshire. It sees the opening of The Hepworth Wakefield gallery, witjavascript:void(0)h inaugural collections displays focussing on Hepworth’s sculpture, the retrospective exhibition of Moore’s work at Leeds Art Gallery, and the prominent inclusion of the two artists’ work at the Henry Moore Institute and Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Next year therefore provides an excellent opportunity to consider the relationships between these two artists in the county of their birth. To enable this, five arts organisations in the region will work together to stage a conference – the first in a series of collaborative events - that considers the local geographical, social and political contexts for the artistic development and subsequent critical reception of Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth.

This two-day conference invites papers that consider Moore and Hepworth in relation to their connections with the Yorkshire region. In doing so, we aim to begin these ‘Moore/Hepworth’ dialogues by focusing on three main areas of critical enquiry:

* Art education, tutors and Leeds College of Art curriculum in the pre- and post-1945 period
* British landscape, archaeology and the construction of person/place/art object identities and the ways that these two artists’ Yorkshire ‘roots’ played an important part in the critical reception of their work
* Collections, exhibitions and the ways in which works of art were acquired and displayed in the region, indoor and outdoor, since the early twentieth century

It aims to examine critically the relationship between these artists and this region, exploring the specificity of place, re-examining the imagery of landscape and asking what impact art education and regional art galleries and collections had on their lives and works. We invite papers that examine the artists individually, however we particularly welcome papers that consider the two together.

The conference timetable will include opportunities to view the exhibitions on display at the five arts organisations at the time.

Please send a short CV and a 250 word abstract for your 20 minute-long paper to Kirstie Gregory (Research Programme Assistant at the Henry Moore Institute): kirstie@henry-moore.ac.uk

The deadline for submissions is 31st October 2010.