Photos: Carlos A. Schwartz – Efraín Pintos

El Guerrero de Goslar (The Warrior of Goslar)

Author
Henry Moore
Edition
I Exhibition (1973-74)
Year
1977
Further information
On display, Rambla de Santa Cruz
Material
Bronze

“The sculptures by Miró and Moore, which had been on display on the Rambla for almost half a year, returned to their places of origin –Paris and London– at the end of the loan period. At that moment, a real popular movement began, echoed by all the media, for the works to return to our city. The authors were not insensitive to such strong social pressure and decided to cede the rights to their sculptures so that new bronze casts could return to us. To this end, it was necessary to raise funds by means of popular fundraising activities, which were complemented by a special grant by the Tenerife Island Council. The works that came on this second occasion did not coincide with those previously exhibited in Santa Cruz and are entitled El Guerrero de Goslar (The Warrior of Goslar) by Henry Moore and Mujer Botella II (Bottle Woman II) by Joan Miró.”

Saavedra Martínez, V. (1996). Historia de un acontecimiento. En A. Carnero, D. Duque, & C. Schwartz, Iª Exposición Internacional de Escultura en La Calle (págs. 11-24). Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Área de Cultura. ISBN: 84-87340-63-6

“Some of these works had to be returned to the borrower, but in the case of Henry Moore, the work exhibited in 1973-74 had the compensation of being replaced by the definitive acquisition of the Guerrero de Goslar (Warrior of Goslar), a bronze sculpture that, as a unique case in Spain, exemplifies the enormous work of the greatest contemporary English sculptor.”

Hernández Perera, J. (1996). Dos décadas de Esculturas en la Calle. En A. Carnero, D. Duque, & C. Schwartz, Iª Exposición Internacional de Escultura en La Calle (págs. 25-54). Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Área de Cultura. ISBN: 84-87340-63-6

“t is easy for me to reconstruct the moment when I first saw Henry Moore’s sculpture The Warrior of Goslar, rightly considered the most important and emblematic piece of the First International Street Sculpture Exhibition. For me, seeing the sculpture there meant, above all, the relationship between an ancient warlike culture and the remote Atlantic space in which it was installed.
What was this warrior, reclining next to his circular shield, doing on an oceanic island, born for the West in the Renaissance? I do not intend to answer that question, but to express the primary meaning of my relationship with Moore’s work. I suspect that in that estrangement, in the very question emanating from the work itself, lies the initial key to our vision of the sculpture.”

(…)

Infinite sensitive lesson of the sculptural form: signifying flesh. Moore’s Warrior of Goslar shows that sculpture is not only a manifestation, but also, at times, an embodiment of space.

In Moore’s bronze one can hear a remote mythical impulse. I am reminded here of Furio Jesi’s reflection: “The time of myth elevates and consecrates the time of history”.

Sánchez Robayna, A. (1996). El espacio de la escultura. En A. Carnero, D. Duque, & C. Schwartz, Iª Exposición Internacional de Escultura en La Calle (págs. 77-86). Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Área de Cultura. ISBN: 84-87340-63-6

“From his studio in London, a work by Henry Moore, Reclining Figure (1963, bronze), became available for some time. But the sculpture (which was actually the working model for the one at the Lincoln Center in New York) was committed to the Tate Gallery in London and was returned. Subsequently, the Architects’ Association contacted the sculptor, who agreed to give a copy of the Warrior of Goslar as a gift. It was cast in Germany on 5 July 1977, and then supervised by the artist himself in his London workshop. The casting and transport costs were paid for by various island institutions and by popular fundraising”

Fernández Lomana, M.A. (1996). De la conmemoración al homenaje. En A. Carnero, D. Duque, & C. Schwartz, Iª Exposición Internacional de Escultura en La Calle (págs. 87-108). Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Área de Cultura. ISBN: 84-87340-63-6