«The creative process is in some sense a secret process. The conception and experimental elaboration of a work of art is a very personal activity, and to suppose that it can be organized and collectivized, like any form of industrial or agricultural production, is to misunderstand the very nature of art. The artist must work in contact with society, but that contact must be an intimate one. I believe that the best artists have always had their roots in a definite social group or community, or in a particular region. We know what small and intimate communities produced the great sculpture of Athens or Chartres or Florence. The sculptor belonged to his city or his guild. In our desire for international unity and far universal co-operation, we must not target the necessity for preserving this somewhat paradoxical relation between the artist's freedom and his social function, between his need for the sympathy of a people and his dependence on internal springs of inspiration»
Henry Moore from the essay Sculptor in modern society in the catalogue: Henry Moore. Gli ultimi 10 anni / The last 10 years, ed. Skira, 1995.