Exploring the relationship between art in two and three dimensions, Sculpture in Painting is not so much concerned with comparing the two disciplines, but with the dialogue between them.  The exhibition, the first at the Henry Moore Institute to consist only of paintings, brings together some thirty works from the 1500s to the present day, by a range of influential artists including Hogarth, Vuillard and Henning. The display includes important national and international loans and will give UK gallery visitors the first opportunity to see The National Gallery’s ‘La Schiavona’ by Titian on display outside London since the 1940s.

 The exhibition begins by looking at the juxtaposition of inanimate sculpture and the ‘living’ human subject.  Taking the Pygmalion story and the idea of humans bringing sculpture to life as a starting point, the display then shifts towards portraits which show people – very often sculptors but also artists’ models – close to ‘their’ sculptures.  The selection also shows how sculptural motifs have been used to suggest the afterlife of the sitter or to foreground their virtues or achievements.  Here Frederic Leighton’s depiction of the Parthenon frieze lends his self-portrait academic weight, whilst in Giorgio de Chirico’s ‘Petrifying Self-Portrait’ the artist involuntarily becomes a statue himself. 

The second section of the show looks at more abstract manifestations of sculpture in painting, revealing the ways in which sculpture has influenced two-dimensional representation. Works here range from de Wit’s amazingly illusionistic depictions of imaginary sculptures to portraits by artists such as Hogarth and Hamilton in which the sitters, male or female, are portrayed as statuesque.

Finally, Sculpture in Painting brings together a range of ‘portraits’ of sculpture.  The quiet composition of William Nicholson’s ‘Statuettes and Rodin Bronze’ from the early twentieth century and Tim Braden’s considered, contemporary depictions of historical sculptures contrast with Edouard Vuillard’s virtuoso brushstrokes suggesting statuettes on a mantelpiece.  Taking sculpture’s depiction in painting right up to the present day, the exhibition clearly demonstrates that the two media still have a fascinating interplay.