Call for Participation – Recasting Global Modernities and the Making of Shared Worlds: New Perspectives through Henry Moore
- Region: East of England
- Type: Conference
- Cost: Free
About the conference
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Tuesday 22 September 2026
University of Cambridge
Wednesday 23 September 2026
The Henry Moore Foundation, in collaboration with the Department of History of Art at the University of Cambridge and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, invites proposals for a two-day interdisciplinary conference exploring new perspectives on modernism through the work and legacy of Henry Moore. Coinciding with two major exhibitions – Henry Moore: Monumental Nature at Kew Gardens and The Art and Life of Henry Moore at the Henry Moore Studios & Gardens – the conference offers a unique platform for dialogue, collaboration, and exchange.
Bringing together scholars, curators, artists, conservators, architects, technicians, heritage professionals, and researchers from across disciplines, the conference seeks to recast modern British art within wider environmental, global, and methodological frameworks. We welcome contributions engaging with themes including artistic production, materiality, environmental thinking, conservation practices, global modernism, architecture, transnational exchange, curatorial practice, institutional histories, artistic labour, and the afterlives of artworks.
Reflecting Moore’s own engagement with environmental, material, professional, and pedagogical perspectives, the conference adopts a multi-site format that combines scholarly discussion with encounters with artworks in situ. As part of the first day, participants will have the opportunity to engage directly with the exhibition and grounds at Kew Gardens through curator-led tours, whilst a spotlight session on day two will explore Moore’s relationship with Cambridge. Following the two-day conference, delegates are offered an optional visit to the Henry Moore Studios & Gardens with an opportunity to explore the site through a curator-led tour of the exhibitions and grounds.
The conference is kindly supported by The British Academy Early Career Research Network, and early career researchers are particularly encouraged to apply.
Day 1: Environmental and Material Imagination
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Set within the living landscape of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, the first day of the conference unfolds in dialogue with Henry Moore: Monumental Nature, the largest outdoor presentation of Moore’s work to date. This session explores the environmental and material dimensions of modern British art, investigating how artistic production, natural resources, and the physical landscape intersect with urgent questions of stewardship, ecology, and responsibility.
By situating Moore’s monumental forms within Kew’s botanical collections, we invite a reconsideration of the artist not merely as a creator of objects, but as a participant in a complex ecosystem. We will examine the lifecycle of the artwork: from the extraction of stone and metal to the atmospheric effects of the outdoor site. This day seeks to bridge the gap between the aesthetic appreciation of ‘nature’ and the material realities of environment, asking how the processes of making, transporting, and displaying sculpture reflect broader planetary concerns.
Through a multidisciplinary lens involving art history, environmental humanities, and material science, this day foregrounds the infrastructures that underpin modernism. Through two distinct but complementary panels, the programme addresses ethics of land use and resource management, the material infrastructures of art, and the meanings generated through observation, form, and landscape to uncover how Moore and his contemporaries navigated the tension between the permanence of monumental art and the fragility of the natural world.
Day 2: Circulations, Nuances, Methods and Afterlives
Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge
The second day turns to movement, exchange, continuity, and interpretation, examining how modern British art circulates across national and transnational networks and how its meanings evolve over time. As such, the programme looks to explore modernism as a dynamic field shaped by mobility, institutional frameworks, and ongoing processes of research, care, and reinterpretation.
Particular attention is given to the ways artworks travel between exhibitions, collections, archives, public spaces, and landscapes, accumulating new meanings as they move across cultural and geographical contexts. The programme considers the networks that enabled artistic exchange and examines how museums, universities, galleries, foundations, and other institutions have contributed to the reception, preservation, and dissemination of modern art.
At the same time, the day reflects on the longer trajectories of artworks beyond their moment of production. How are artistic legacies constructed and sustained? How do conservation, curatorial practice, archival research, and institutional stewardship shape the histories that are told about modern art? What happens when artworks are reinterpreted through new social, political, environmental, or methodological perspectives?
Through two complementary panels, the programme explores both the circulation of artistic ideas and the afterlives of artworks as objects of care, interpretation, and institutional memory. Together, they invite participants to reconsider British modernism not as a fixed historical category, but as a continually evolving field shaped by exchange, context, and critical reflection.
Submit a proposal
We are seeking proposals for contributions to the panels listed on our website in the form of 20-minute presentations. Please visit https://henry-moore.org/discover-and-research/sculpture-research-programme/calls-for-papers/recasting-global-modernities/ for detailed information on the panel sessions for both days.
- a brief abstract (no more than 250 words)
- a short biographical note (100 words)
The deadline to apply is Wednesday 22 July 2026.
Please email your proposals, indicating your panel preference, to: hm.archive@henry-moore.org
If you would like to apply in another format, such as video or audio, this is also welcomed. Please contact hm.archive@henry-moore.org if you would like to discuss this.
Successful applicants will be notified the week commencing 3 August 2026.