Flowering Curves

"God!" screeched the voice, "how funny it is!" Most sculptors would have been tempted to throw a mallet, but Gerhard Henning, Denmark's best sculptor, ignored his parrot Jakob, gave a few final taps with his hammer, and stepped back to survey his work. Before him was a life-sized figure of a Nordic maiden chiseled in grey limestone. Sculptor Henning grunted critically. His Recumbent Girl, finished last week for Copenhagen's Carlsberg museum, was his first major work in two years, and he wanted it to be perfect.

Danes love sculpture and Henning has long been one of their favorites. His statues and statuettes--of girls with geese, girls sitting, undressing, standing, kissing --line Denmark's parks and museums, grace its finest homes. All have Henning's trademark: heavy, flowering curves, and a warm, sleepy sense of relaxation. Two years ago Gerhard Henning, 70 and ill, put aside his chisel. Now that he was back at work again, more relaxed limestone girls will be following Recumbent Girl out of Henning's studio.

The son of a Swedish tailor, Henning began as a painter but found himself molding handfuls of stucco into tiny figures. The Royal Copenhagen Porcelain Factory offered him a job and for 16 years he turned out lifelike figurines.

But Henning wanted something more. In France he had been impressed by Rodin and Maillol; he had also read the love poems of Ovid. He began to develop a style of his own with small statues of intertwined lovers in clay. He was urged to do major pieces for exhibition. "I don't like exhibitions," grumbled Henning. But he did more figures, and at 44 he let people have a look. The cheers have been ringing in Henning's ears ever since.

More & more, Henning has restricted his work to sculptures of women. He works with very few models; when he finds one he likes, he keeps her for a long time, paying her by the month. One he kept for ten years, another for seven.

Women, says Henning, are not for the inexperienced. A young artist's apprenticeship should be spent studying the male body, "with all the muscles you don't see on the woman." In fact, says Henning, "students should not be allowed to have female models--except maybe on Sundays. A man is something you study. A girl is something you love."

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