Upright And Motive

My daughter sent me a text message early this morning. "I don't know if you're interested in taking pictures of soldiers but 200 of them are marching through Harlow town today."

I researched online and learnt that it was the Royal Anglian Regiment back from Afghanistan. The regiment has been granted the freedom of the town and today they exercised their right to march through it carrying fixed bayonets.

I arrived early and asked a couple of security men where a good vantage point would be and positioned myself outside the Civic Centre with Henry Moore's Family Group behind me. A woman saw me photograph the sculpture in my pic. "Do you know what that is and who it is by?" I replied that I didn't but that I always research what I shoot and soon would do. I was able to reel off lots of the sculptures around town that I have captured in the past. She turned out to be a leading light of Sculpture Town. She disappeared into the Civic Centre and later sent a minion with a map of where all the artworks are for me.

The piece is Upright Motive 2 by Henry Moore. It is one of a series inspired by a Lombardy poplar growing behind the long low Olivetti building in Milan that Moore had received a commission to design a sculpture for.

The Royal Anglian Regiment are motive, bolt upright as they pass. I've never seen active soldiers in the flesh before. I was touched, proud and amazed by how focused they were.