BERNARD MEADOWS | SPRING 'SEASONS' COCK

Fischer Fine Art, London, 1987, where acquired by Maurice Cooke, 17 September 1987

His Estate sale, Sotheby's, London, 15 December 2010, lot 3

Alan Bowness, Bernard Meadows: Sculpture and Drawings, London, 1995, cat. no.BM 40, p.49, illustrated pl.28 (another cast)

London, Tate, The Seasons organised by the Contemporary Art Society, 1956 (another cast)

Venice, The British Pavilion, Venice Biennale, 1964 (another cast)

Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, Hilton, Irwin, Meadows, Tilson, May - June 1965, cat. no.48, illustrated (another cast)

The present work is typical of Meadow's work in the 1950s, and indeed British sculpture more generally of the period, which was characterised by angular, aggressive imagery that in the wake of the violence of the Second World War, Herbert Read dubbed the 'geometry of fear'. Animal imagery was often used in place of the human figure, and in Meadows' case he frequently resorted to crabs or birds. As Henry Moore's former studio assistant, it was also a means of distinguishing his work from the rounded, figurative forms of his mentor.