Art: Fiery Fiore

A cigar-smoking, 32-year-old sculptress named Fiore de Henriquez rippled the placid pond of British art last summer by inspiring venerable (75) Painter Augustus John to work in clay (TIME, Feb. 23). Last week Fiore was showing off her own work at her first one-woman show in London. She was a good show herself, greeting visitors with a middleweight’s handclasp, swinging her heavy black mop of hair and dusting her 21 exhibits with the sleeves of her sweater. Her work was less lively than she, but it showed promise.

There were some rather conventional heads; softer, less formal busts, mostly in terra cotta; small plaques, mostly religious in subject; two lead statues, Standing Figure of a Boy and The Bird Boy, both pseudo-Grecian, idealistic pieces. Outshining them all was a bust of Augustus John, a shaggy, forceful bronze that seemed like a quick-frozen hunk of the old man. Said Time & Tide: “A searching interest in humanity . . .” Reported Fiore: “Augustus said I was a master. He may have been a little tipsy at the time, but I think he meant it.”

Fiore hopes to settle in the U.S. She likes big group sculpture, and feels the U.S. is just the place for it: “First because they have money. And then, places like Texas, why, they must want big group pieces, perhaps a stagecoach in the square.” Her first American project will be on a smaller scale: a head of Adlai Stevenson.