D'Arcy Thompson's 'On Growth and Form' (Henry Moore Institute: Essays on Sculpture No. 70)

On Growth and Form, written in 1917 by the biologist D'Arcy Thompson, is a poetic and mathematical study of scale, gravity, order and process within developing beings. It is a book that has lodged itself within the consciousness of twentieth-century sculpture; Henry Moore turned to Thompson's work while studying in Leeds in 1919, and Richard Hamilton took the title for his 1951 landmark exhibition at London's Institute of Contemporary Art.

In this edition of our Essays on Sculpture series, Matthew Jarron gives an introduction to On Growth and Form and its legacy influencing generations of artists, while Martin Hammer looks at 'The Growth and Form of Artistic Responses to D'Arcy Thompson'. Also featuring an in-conversation between Professor Martin Kemp (Emeritus Research Professor in the History of Arts at Oxford University) and Lisa Le Feuvre (Head of Sculpture Studies at the Henry Moore Institute).