Now armour is an outside shell like the shell of a snail which is there to protect the more vulnerable forms inside, as it is in human armour which is hard and put on to protect the soft body. This has led sometimes to the idea of the Mother and Child where the outer form, the mother, is protecting the inner form, the child, like a mother does protect her child.
The internal/external form is one of the three main themes that reappear throughout Moore's work. This work, like many others in Moore's oeuvre, began life as a maquette, standing just over 21 centimetres high.
How was it made?
A grid system enabled Moore's assistants to calculate exactly the size of each part of the smaller sculpture, and using a hot wire they cut a scaled-up version of each section into the 45 centimetre deep blocks of polystyrene. Excess polystyrene was removed using saws and wire brushes. These sections would then be shaped until each segment married up to its adjacent piece. Upper parts of the form were often altered by the artist to compensate for the new perspective offered by the increased height of the sculpture. These blocks were then sent to a bronze foundry, in this case Morris Singer, cast section by section and then welded together.
This sculpture is usually on display at the Henry Moore Foundation in Perry Green; the only other cast is in the First National Plaza, Chicago.
this so tree like, especially because its smooth and it's so monumental and quiet