Elephant Skull is an etching from 1969 in Henry Moore's classic print style. Moore was fascinated by an elephant skull that his friends kept as a sculpture in their garden and they gifted it to him in 1966. The skull was one of his favourite items in his studio and Moore explored its monumental form; this etching is one in a series of elephant skull prints that Moore created of various viewpoints. 
 
Signed and numbered out of the edition of 100 in pencil by Moore.
 
Print image measures 25 x 20 cm. Overall print sheet measures 48.5 x 35.5 cm. 
Frame measures 50.3 x 37.3 cm.
 
Henry Moore (1898-1986) was an English artist best known for exploring the human form. Moore received a grant to study art and became a member of Unit One, a group of Modernist artists, and later the English Surrealist movement. He also taught art. During World War 2 Moore was appointed a war artist and his sketches during the Blitz are extremely well known. Moore went on to work with sculpture and created semi-abstract forms from small to monumental scale, receiving important commissions during his career and he grew to international fame with a major retrospective by the MOMA in New York in 1946. He also won the International Prize for Sculpture at the Venice Biennale in 1948. Moore continued to draw, paint and work with sculpture during his life, focussing on human form and nature. He declined a knighthood because he didn’t want to be seen as an established figure. Later in his career, Moore became the world’s most successful living artist at auction. The Henry Moore Foundation was set up to promote the arts and it has the world’s largest collection of his work, displayed in his home and the grounds of the estate. His work is exhibited extensively and the Tate holds a large collection of sculptures that he gifted to them.