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camera substituted for the human eye, engaging with sculpture in three dimensions. 20 For John Read, documentary was 'a new form of communication … as important and significant as writing or printing'. 21 He attempted a new approach for each subject, with a preference for working with individual artists 'to record the business of art in the making.' 22 Reviewing Read's films since 1957, Patrick Hayman summarised them as economically made using 35mm black-and-white film, BBC equipment and minimal crew, with Read acting mostly as scriptwriter and director. Aptly for television, they made considerable use of close-ups, allowed artists time to talk and make their point, and featured lengthy sequences with a 'leisurely editing style'. 23 In L.S. Lowry (1957), Read pioneered the use of the tape recorder, allowing the artist to speak for longer without the interruption of the 35mm-reel changeover. 24 Read's six-part BBC series 'e Artist Speaks', broadcast in July–August 1960 and featuring episodes on Kenneth Armitage, Reg Butler, Michael Ayrton, Anthony Gross, Josef Herman and Victor Pasmore, profited from this technique. As Read recalled, sound recordings could be made in the artists' homes or studios before or during filming, read from scripts or spoken 'off the cuff', with words and visuals 'edited simultaneously in the film cutting room'. 25 Read's films on Moore (1951, 1958, 1967 and 1973), Butler (1958), Armitage (1960) and Hepworth (1961) not only set a high benchmark as documentaries on sculptors but provide a useful context for considering Forma's approach. 5 BRITISH SCULPTORS (WORK AND TALK) In Forma's apartment was a framed set of black-and-white photographs, three of which – depicting Max Ernst, Pablo Picasso and Igor Stravinsky – were affectionately inscribed to Forma and his wife. Wonderfully varied, each portrait seems to catch the spirit of its subject. e photographer was Forma's friend and client Arnold Newman, celebrated for his portraits depicting subjects in their natural surroundings: an approach calculated to set them at ease as well as to convey significant contextual information. Newman's exhibition Artists Look Like is (Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1945), 26 featuring 59 artists in their studios or alongside their work, had proved revelatory. One reviewer observed, 'Ordinarily the artist portrays his idea for others to look at. In [this] exhibition … it is the artists themselves who are portrayed … in the belief that the artist's personality is a clue to his work.' 27 Forma followed Newman's approach. Describing the filming of 5 British Sculptors, he stated, Last summer [1963] I went to England with a tape recorder and some cameras to capture the ideas and thinking of five British sculptors. Each sculptor spoke freely into the tape recorder without the use of notes or reference material. Although you will read printed words [in this book], they are not from the artist writing, but from the artist speaking. 20. J.P. Hodin, 'Two English films', in Films on Art, Paris, UNESCO, 1951. 21. John Read, 'Is there a documentary art?', Sight and Sound, vol. 17 no. 68, December 1948, pp. 158. 22. John Read, 'e art film and television', Athene, vol. 7, no. 4, June 1956, pp. 18–19; John Read, 'e film on art as a documentary', Film Culture, vol. 3, no. 3, 1957, p. 7. 23. Patrick Hayman, 'Art Films by John Read', Sight and Sound, vol. 26, no. 4, spring 1957, p. 217. 24. Katerina Loukopoulou, 'A sculptor's life on screen: John Read's film portraits of Henry Moore for BBC television', in Roger Hallas (ed.), Documenting the Visual Arts, Routledge, 2020, p. 41. 25. John Read, 'e Artist Speaks', BBC TV, London, [n.d.], cited in Orazio Fumagalli, 'e Television Medium and Television Programs on Art', PhD thesis, University of Iowa, 1963, p. 177. 26. e photographs in Forma's apartment were from this series. 27. 'Artists Look Like is', New York Times, 4 November 1945, p. 8. 10