57 MOORE WORKS BOUGHT BY HALL FOUNDATION

A Dallas art dealer has mediated the sale of 57 works by the late British sculptor Henry Moore to the Hall Family Foundation in Kansas City, Mo.

The pieces include nine monumental bronze sculptures, the largest 18 feet tall and weighing 7,000 pounds, said art dealer Gerald Peters. All were collected by George Ablah of Wichita, Kan., over two decades.

“This might be one of the largest sales in modern art history,” Peters said, adding that the group attracted bids from the National Gallery in Washington, D.C., and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Ablah refused to disclose the purchase price, other than noting it was less than $20 million.

The Hall Family Foundation (established by the family that founded Hallmark Cards) will loan the collection to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Mo.

The nine large pieces will be placed outdoors, along with several other Moore works already displayed on the meadow-like expanse of the museum’s east lawn, said foundation spokesman Bill Hall.

In addition to the outdoor sculptures, the Ablah collection includes 19 working models--bronze pieces ranging in size from 3 feet to 5 feet--29 smaller bronzes and some tapestries. He said the Moore works should be installed and open to the public by next summer.

Moore, who has been called by one art critic “the most dominant creative force of his epoch,” died last August in England at age 88.