Anchor, Move, Connect
Henry Moore’s Large Arch
In the spring of 1971, Henry Moore’s Large Arch was installed in the heart of Columbus.
Situated in a broad plaza between the Cleo Rogers Memorial Library, First Christian Church, and the Irwin home, the monumental bronze sculpture serves as a visual anchor, inviting us to move our bodies and eyes through the plaza. Large Arch connects us as a community to our immediate surroundings and to places far away.
The Site
During the dedication of the Cleo Rogers Memorial Library and Large Arch on May 16, 1971, architect I.M. Pei proclaimed the newly created public space was more important than the surrounding buildings and sculpture. The public space, he explained, represented the spirit of the Columbus community.
For Pei, Columbus was synonymous with the pursuit of excellence. The library with its plaza and sculpture was further proof of the community’s commitment to excellence.
I.M. Pei & Associates was commissioned in 1964 to design the Cleo Rogers Memorial Library for the Bartholomew County Public Library. Kenneth D.B. Carruthers was the project architect; he worked for I.M.Pei & Associates for 14 years. The new building, completed in 1969, replaced the 1903 Columbus Public Library, designed by J.W. Gaddis with funding from Andrew Carnegie.
A Broad, Open Space
Before the idea of the arch was the idea of a broad, open space between the new library building, Eliel Saarinen's First Christian Church, and the Irwin home. The space would be the center for downtown cultural life.
The earliest drawings and the accompanying model from April 1964 show a large circular fountain. As the design developed over the next five years, what occupied the open space changed, but the idea of the space would persist.
In front of the proposed library building is a circular fountain.
A Suitable Sculpture
In February 1966, project architect Kenneth D.B. Carruthers sent then library director Gerald M. Born a sketch of the library plaza to show "the relation of the steps and the plaza to the Irwin Home and how the steps focus upon the Library entrance." The sketch's fanciful equestrian statue atop a column serves to frame the picture rather than propose a particular sculpture.
Carruthers wrote to Born in June 1966 that a suitable fountain or sculpture had not yet been procured for the plaza. Three years later, as construction of the library was nearly complete, Carruthers urged the Library Board to consider acquiring a sculpture, enclosing a picture of Henry Moore's Large Torso.
Patrons Sought
With encouragement from Pei and Carruthers, the library board approved acquiring a sculpture despite knowing its cost was well beyond the construction budget.
As construction neared completion, Carruthers sent the library a picture of Henry Moore's Large Torso and urged them to act. His letter spurred library board present John K. Keach to ask J. Irwin Miller to commission a sculpture.
Keach wrote, "The Board and the architect feel a sculpture of sufficient scale would enhance this space and create an important focal point." Miller and his wife Xenia S. Miller agreed to donate Large Arch to the library.
Pei's Anchor
Pei believed a monumental, abstract sculpture would not be lost among the plaza's buildings. A bronze scupture would complement the library's bronze details and contrast with the brick and stone.
Pei considered Henry Moore the ideal artist for the project. During a visit to Moore's studio, Pei recalled his young daughter Liane had delighted in running through and around Moore's Large Torso sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art. Moore agreed to Pei's suggestion to enlarge the 6-foot-6-inch-tall sculpture to nearly 20 feet.
Moore's Movement
According to Pei's account of his visit to Henry Moore's studio in Hertfordshire, England, Moore's studio assistants made a mock-up of Large Arch out of polystyrene.
If Large Arch was to serve as a visual anchor between buildings for Pei, Moore envisioned the sculpture as dynamic. Moore wantedthe enlarged sculpture to be wide enough for two people to walk through it hand-in-hand, but not so wide for a car to pass through.
When placing the sculpture, Moore said Pei should consider movement, asking how people would walk towards it and through it, and how the sun would move across it.
The Community Connects
Xenia S. Miller and J. Irwin Miller donated Large Arch to the library. Both were deeply moved by the sculpture.
Days after it was installed, J. Irwin Miller wrote to Moore that "the community comes to see it, touch it, walk round and through it, sketch it until late hours at night, and, in a most real and human way it has now become a physical and spiritual center of our town."