Barbara Hepworth Explained

Honorific Prefix:Dame
Barbara Hepworth
Birth Name:Jocelyn Barbara Hepworth
Birth Date:10 January 1903
Birth Place:Wakefield, West Riding of Yorkshire, England
Death Place:St Ives, Cornwall, England
Field:Sculpture
Training:
Movement:Modernism, abstract art
Spouse:
    Children:4, including Simon Nicholson

    Dame Jocelyn Barbara Hepworth (10 January 1903 – 20 May 1975) was an English artist and sculptor. Her work exemplifies Modernism and in particular modern sculpture. Along with artists such as Ben Nicholson and Naum Gabo, Hepworth was a leading figure in the colony of artists who resided in St Ives during the Second World War.

    Born in Wakefield, Yorkshire, Hepworth studied at Leeds School of Art and the Royal College of Art in the 1920s. She married the sculptor John Skeaping in 1925. In 1931 she fell in love with the painter Ben Nicholson, and in 1933 divorced Skeaping. At this time she was part of a circle of modern artists centred on Hampstead, London, and was one of the founders of the art movement Unit One.

    At the beginning of the Second World War Hepworth and Nicholson moved to St Ives, Cornwall, where she would remain for the rest of her life. Best known as a sculptor, Hepworth also produced drawings – including a series of sketches of operating rooms following the hospitalisation of her daughter in 1944 – and lithographs. She died in a fire at her studio in 1975.

    Biography

    Early life

    Jocelyn Barbara Hepworth was born on 10 January 1903 in Wakefield, West Riding of Yorkshire, the eldest child of Gertrude and Herbert Hepworth. Her father was a civil engineer for the West Riding County Council, who in 1921 advanced to the role of county surveyor. Hepworth attended Wakefield Girls' High School, where she was awarded music prizes at the age of 12[1] [2] and won a scholarship to study at the Leeds School of Art from 1920. It was there that she met her fellow Yorkshireman, Henry Moore. They became friends and established a friendly rivalry that lasted professionally for many years.

    Despite the difficulties of attempting to gain a position in what was a male-dominated environment,[3] Hepworth successfully won a county scholarship to attend the Royal College of Art (RCA) in London and studied there from 1921 until she was awarded the diploma of the Royal College of Art in 1924.

    Early career

    Following her studies at the RCA, Hepworth travelled to Florence, Italy, in 1924 on a West Riding Travel Scholarship. Hepworth was also the runner-up for the Prix-de-Rome, which the sculptor John Skeaping won. After travelling with him to Siena and Rome, Hepworth married Skeaping in May 1925 in Florence. In Italy, Hepworth learned how to carve marble from sculptor Giovanni Ardini. Hepworth and Skeaping returned to London in 1926, where they exhibited their works together from their flat. Their son Paul was born in London in 1929. In 1931, Hepworth met and fell in love with abstract painter Ben Nicholson; however, both were still married at the time.[4] Hepworth filed for divorce from Skeaping that year;[5] they were divorced in March 1933.

    Her early work was highly interested in abstraction and art movements on the continent. In 1931, Hepworth was the first to sculpt the pierced figures that are characteristic of both her own work and, later, that of Henry Moore.[6] They would lead in the path to modernism in sculpture. In 1933, Hepworth travelled with Nicholson to France, where they visited the studios of Jean Arp, Pablo Picasso, and Constantin Brâncuși. Hepworth later became involved with the Paris-based art movement, Abstraction-Création. In 1933, Hepworth co-founded the Unit One art movement with Nicholson and Paul Nash, the critic Herbert Read, and the architect Wells Coates. The movement sought to unite Surrealism and abstraction in British art.

    Hepworth also helped raise awareness of continental artists amongst the British public. In 1937, she designed the layout for , a 300-page book that surveyed Constructivist artists and that was published in London and edited by Nicholson, Naum Gabo, and Leslie Martin.

    Hepworth, with Nicholson, gave birth to triplets in 1934: Rachel, Sarah, and Simon. Hepworth, atypically, found a way to both take care of her children and continue producing her art. "A woman artist", she argued, "is not deprived by cooking and having children, nor by nursing children with measles (even in triplicate) – one is in fact nourished by this rich life, provided one always does some work each day; even a single half hour, so that the images grow in one's mind." Hepworth married Nicholson on 17 November 1938 at Hampstead Register Office in north London, following his divorce from his wife Winifred. Rachel and Simon also became artists.

    St Ives

    Hepworth, Nicholson and their children went to live in Cornwall at the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939.[7] She lived in Trewyn Studios in St Ives from 1949 until her death in 1975. Trewyn Studios had once been an outbuilding of Trewyn House, later purchased by her pupil and assistant John Milne in 1956.[8] She said that "Finding Trewyn Studio was sort of magic. Here was a studio, a yard, and garden where I could work in open air and space." St Ives had become a refuge for many artists during the war. On 8 February 1949, Hepworth and Nicholson co-founded the Penwith Society of Arts at the Castle Inn; 19 artists were founding members, including Peter Lanyon and Bernard Leach.

    Hepworth was also a skilled draughtsperson. After her daughter Sarah was hospitalised in 1944, she struck up a close friendship with the surgeon Norman Capener.[9] At Capener's invitation, she was invited to view surgical procedures and, between 1947 and 1949, she produced nearly 80 drawings of operating rooms in chalk, ink, and pencil.[9] [10] Hepworth was fascinated by the similarities between surgeons and artists, stating: "There is, it seems to me, a close affinity between the work and approach of both physicians and surgeons, and painters and sculptors."[9]

    In 1950, works by Hepworth were exhibited in the British Pavilion at the XXV Venice Biennale alongside works by Matthew Smith and John Constable. The 1950 Biennale was the last time that contemporary British artists were exhibited alongside artists from the past. Two early public commissions, Contrapunctal Forms and Turning Forms, were exhibited at the Festival of Britain in 1951.[11] [12]

    During this period, Hepworth and Nicholson divorced (1951). Hepworth moved away from working only in stone or wood and began to work with bronze and clay. Hepworth often used her garden in St Ives, which she designed with her friend the composer Priaulx Rainier, to view her large-scale bronzes.

    Death of her son Paul

    Her eldest son Paul was killed on 13 February 1953 in a plane crash while serving with the Royal Air Force in Thailand. A memorial to him, Madonna and Child, is in the parish church of St Ives.

    Exhausted, in part from her son's death, Hepworth travelled to Greece with her friend Margaret Gardiner in August 1954. They visited Athens, Delphi and many of the Aegean Islands.

    When Hepworth returned to St Ives from Greece in August 1954 she found that Gardiner had sent her a large shipment of Nigerian guarea hardwood. Although she received only a single tree trunk, Hepworth noted that the shipment from Nigeria to the Tilbury docks came in at 17 tons. Between 1954 and 1956 Hepworth sculpted six pieces out of guarea wood, many of which were inspired by her trip to Greece, such as Corinthos (1954) and Curved Form (Delphi) (1955).

    Ambivalent burden of international reputation

    It was also during this decade that Hepworth became preoccupied with the idea of establishing a market base for her work in the United States. Initially she hoped to follow Henry Moore's successful sale of artwork via Curt Valentin of Bucholz Gallery in New York. Negotiations with Valentin did result in a number of American sales, but despite the sales, and despite interventions by Hepworth's friends, Valentin rebuffed repeated requests to hold any substantial stock of her work. It was not until 1955, after the Martha Jackson Gallery had offered Hepworth the opportunity to exhibit in their space alongside works by William Scott and Francis Bacon, that Hepworth formalised gallery representation in the new world.[13]

    Hepworth's difficulties in establishing a stable gallery relationship in the United States have been attributed to many factors, including the artist's own diffidence regarding personal promotion of her work. When Martha Jackson failed to arrange the solo American exhibition of sculptures and drawings that Hepworth demanded, Hepworth moved, in 1957, to Galerie Chalette, run by Arthur and Madeleine Lejwa, known for their close relationship with Jean Arp, and dedication to close relationships with their artists.[14]

    The Lejwas came through with the solo exhibition Hepworth craved.[13] Hepworth came to New York for the opening (her first visit to the city),[15] but made minimal contact with the press and left as soon as possible. "Have seen all the press", she wrote, "pulled faces at the camera and generally done my best!"[13]

    Three years later, having secured the Dag Hammarskjöld Memorial Commission (Single Form, 1964), she left both Chalette and Gimpel Fils, her long-time home agent, for the larger Marlborough Fine Art and Marlborough-Gerson. "Pulled between personal loyalties and professional aspirations", Hepworth chose to forfeit the personal relationships.[16]

    Late career

    Hepworth greatly increased her studio space in 1960 when she purchased the Palais de Danse, a former cinema and dance hall, that was situated across the street from Trewyn. She used this new space to work on large-scale commissions.

    She also experimented with lithography in her late career, and produced two lithographic suites with the Curwen Gallery and its director Stanley Jones, one in 1969 and one in 1971. The latter was entitled "The Aegean Suite" (1971) and was inspired by Hepworth's trip to Greece in 1954 with Margaret Gardiner.[17] The artist also produced a set of lithographs entitled "Opposing Forms" (1970) with Marlborough Fine Art in London.[17]

    Barbara Hepworth died in an accidental fire at her Trewyn studios on 20 May 1975 at the age of 72.[18]

    Famous sculptures

    In 1951 Hepworth was commissioned by the Arts Council to create a piece for the Festival of Britain. The resulting work featured two Irish limestone figures entitled, "Contrapuntal Forms" (1950), which was displayed on London's South Bank;[19] it was later donated to the New Town of Harlow and displayed in Glebelands, where it remains. To complete the large-scale piece Hepworth hired her first assistants, Terry Frost, Denis Mitchell, and John Wells.

    From 1949 onwards she worked with assistants, 16 in all.[20] One of her most prestigious works is Single Form, which was made in memory of her friend and collector of her works, the former Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld, and which stands in the plaza of the United Nations building in New York City. It was commissioned by Jacob Blaustein, a former United States delegate to the U.N., in 1961 following Hammarskjöld's death in a plane crash.

    On 20 December 2011, her 1969 sculpture Two Forms was stolen, from its plinth in Dulwich Park, South London. Suspicions are that the theft was by scrap metal thieves. The piece, which had been in the park since 1970, was insured for £500,000, a spokesman for Southwark Council said.

    One of the editions of six of her 1964 bronze sculpture, Rock Form (Porthcurno), was removed from the Mander Centre in Wolverhampton in the spring of 2014 by its owners, the Royal Bank of Scotland and Dalancey Estates. Its sudden disappearance led to questions in Parliament in September 2014. Paul Uppal, Member of Parliament for Wolverhampton South West said: "When the Rock Form was donated by the Mander family, it was done so in the belief it would be enjoyed and cherished by the people of Wolverhampton for generations... It belongs to, and should be enjoyed by, the City of Wolverhampton." The sculpture has since been loaned to the city by RBS and can be seen in Wolverhampton City Art Gallery.

    Recognition

    Hepworth was awarded the Grand Prix at the 1959 São Paulo Art Biennial. She was awarded the Freedom of St Ives in 1968 as an acknowledgment of her significant contributions to the town; she was a member of the St Ives Trust (which sought to protect the town's character and architectural heritage), a founder member of the 'Art in Schools' programme run by Cornwall County Council, and had gifted several sculptures to the town.[21] The same year, she was inducted into Gorsedh Kernow with the bardic name Cornish: Gravyor (meaning "Sculptor")[22] – this was described as an "extraordinary honour" given that she was not a Cornish native. She was awarded honorary degrees from the universities of Birmingham (1960), Leeds (1961), Exeter (1966), Oxford (1968), London (1970) and Manchester (1971).

    She was appointed CBE in 1958 and DBE in 1965. In 1973 she was elected an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Following her death, her studio and home in St Ives became the Barbara Hepworth Museum, which came under control of the Tate in 1980.

    In 2011 The Hepworth Wakefield opened in Hepworth's hometown of Wakefield, England. The Museum was designed by the architect David Chipperfield.[23]

    In January 2015 Tate Britain staged a major retrospective with over 70 of Hepworth's works. The first large London show since 1968, it included her well-known major abstract carvings and bronzes, as well as previously unseen photographs and a 1930s self-photogram.[24]

    On 25 August 2020, Google honoured Hepworth with a Google Doodle.[25] A Historic England blue plaque was unveiled in honour of Hepworth and first husband John Skeaping at 24 St Ann's Terrace, St John's Wood, London on 30 October 2020. The couple lived there in 1927.[26] [27]

    Hepworth's work was included in the 2021 exhibition Women in Abstraction at the Centre Pompidou.[28]

    The first major survey of Hepworth's work, Barbara Hepworth: In Equilibrium was held at Heide Museum of Modern Art in Melbourne from 5 November 2022 to 13 March 2023.[29] Her work had a wide influence on Australian sculpture.[30]

    List of selected works

    Year(s)TitleMaterialNotes
    1927 DovesParian marble[31]
    1932–33 Seated Figurelignum vitae
    1933 Two Formsalabaster and limestone
    1934 Mother and ChildCumberland alabaster
    1935 Three FormsSeravezza marble
    1936 Ball Plane and Holelignum vitae, mahogany and oak
    1937 Pierced Hemisphere 1white marble
    1940 Sculpture with Colour (Deep Blue and Red)mixed
    1943 Oval Sculpturecast material
    1943–44 Wavewood, paint and string
    1944 Landscape Sculpturewood (cast in bronze, 1961)
    1946 Pelagoswood, paint and string- Tideswood and paint
    1947 Blue and green (arthroplasty) 31 December 1947oil and pencil on pressed paperboard
    1948 Surgeon Waitingoil and pencil on pressed paperboard
    1949 Operation: Case for Discussionoil and pencil on pressed paperboard
    1951 Group I (Concourse) 4 February 1951Serravezza marble
    1953 HieroglyphAncaster stone
    1953 Monolith-EmpyreanAncaster stone
    1954–55 Two Figuresteak and paint
    1955 Oval Sculpture (Delos)scented guarea wood and paint
    1955–56 Corébronze
    1956 Curved Form (Trevalgan)bronze (see external link to collection of Margaret Gardiner)
    1956 Orpheus (Maquette), Version IIbrass and cotton string- Stringed Figure (Curlew), Version IIbrass and cotton string
    1958 Cantate Dominobronze- Sea Form (Porthmeor)bronze
    1959 Curved form with inner form – animabronze
    1960 Figure for Landscapebronze- Archaeonbronze- Meridianbronze
    1960–62 Curved Reclining Form (Rosewall)Nabresina limestone
    1961 Curved Formbronze
    1962–63 Bronze Form (Patmos)bronze
    1963 Winged Figurebronze
    1963–65 Sphere with Inner Formbronze
    1964 Rock Form (Porthcurno)bronze- Sea Form (Atlantic)bronze- Oval Form (Trezion)bronze - Single Formbronze
    1966 Figure in a Landscapebronze on wooden base- Four-Square Walk Throughbronze
    1967 Two Forms (Orkney)slate
    1968 Two Figuresbronze and gold
    1969 Two Formsbronze
    1970 Family of Manbronze
    1971 The Aegean Suiteseries of prints- Summer Dancepainted bronze
    1972 Minoan Headmarble on wooden base- valign="top" Assembly of Sea Formswhite marble
    mounted on stainless steel base
    1973 Conversation with Magic Stonesbronze and silver

    Marble portrait heads dating from London, ca. 1927, of Barbara Hepworth by John Skeaping, and of Skeaping by Hepworth, are documented by photograph in the Skeaping Retrospective catalogue, but are both believed to be lost.

    Galleries and locations exhibiting her work

    Two museums are named after Hepworth and have significant collections of her work: the Barbara Hepworth Museum in St Ives, Cornwall, and The Hepworth Wakefield in West Yorkshire. Her work also may be seen at:

    Further reading

    Biographies

    Monographs

    Exhibition catalogues

    External links

    Notes and References

    1. Encyclopedia: 'Rhythm of the Stones': Barbara Hepworth and Music. Bowness. Sophie. Barbara Hepworth : centenary. Stephens. Chris. 2003. Tate. London. 25. 978-1-85437-479-0.
    2. Book: Barbara . Hepworth . Barbara Hepworth: A Pictorial Autobiography . Praeger Publishers . 1970 . 1st . New York . 73-99496.
    3. Book: Festing, Sally . Barbara Hepworth: A Life of Forms . 1995 . xviii, 24.
    4. Web site: 10 July 2015. The personal and professional life of Barbara Hepworth . 25 August 2020. The National Archives blog.
    5. Web site: 1931. Divorce Court File: 1565. Appellant: Jocelyn Barbara Skeaping. Respondent: John Rattenbury Skeaping.... 16 March 2022. The National Archives.
    6. Winterson . Jeanette . The hole of life . Tate Magazine . 5. Tate Gallery . London.
    7. Book: Great Women Artists . 2019 . Phaidon Press . 978-0-7148-7877-5 . 183.
    8. Web site: 'Credo', John Milne, 1974. Andrew . Wilson. June 2019. 11 January 2023. Tate.
    9. Web site: Barbara Hepworth: The Hospital Drawings 27th November 2012. pallant.org.uk. Pallant House Gallery. 11 February 2016. 15 February 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160215233228/http://pallant.org.uk/about1/press-office/press-releases/2012/barbara-hepworth-hospital-drawings. dead.
    10. Book: Hepburn, Nathaniel. Tate. 978-1-84976-165-9. Barbara Hepworth: The Hospital Drawings. New York. 2013.
    11. News: Harlow's Hidden Hepworth Sculpture. Irena Posner. HENI Talks.
    12. News: Revisiting Turning Forms. The Hepworth Wakefield.
    13. Roberts . Emma . Representation and Reputation: Barbara Hepworth's Relationships with her American and British Dealers . Tate Papers 20, Autumn 2013. Tate Gallery . London . 1753-9854 . 2013.
    14. Web site: Christie's announces selections from the Israel Museum to benefit the acquisitions fund . Art Daily . 2018 . 21 March 2020 .
    15. Web site: Bowness . Sophie . Barbara Hepworth Chronology . Hepworth Estate.
    16. Correia . Alice . Barbara Hepworth and Gimpel Fils: The Rise and Fall of an Artist-Dealer Relationship. Tate Papers 22. Tate Gallery . London . 1753-9854 . 2014.
    17. Web site: Barbara Hepworth: Graphic works 26 April 2013 – 7 February 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20130508054016/http://www.hepworthwakefield.org/whatson/barbara-hepworth-graphic-works/. dead. 8 May 2013. hepworthwakefield.org. The Hepworth Wakefield. 11 February 2016.
    18. Web site: Bowness. Sophie. Biography. barbarahepworth.org.uk. Sophie Bowness. 11 February 2016.
    19. News: Harlow's Hidden Hepworth Sculpture. Irena Posner. HENI Talks.
    20. Book: Festing, Sally. Barbara Hepworth: A Life of Forms. 1995. xx, 185–86, 197, 214, 219–20.
    21. Book: Chris . Stephens . Miranda . Phillips . Jodi . Dickinson . Barbara Hepworth Sculpture Garden . 2002 . . 978-1-84976-794-1.
    22. Web site: Gorsedh Procession through St Just . BFI Player . 21 March 2023.
    23. Web site: Our gallery. hepworthwakefield.org. The Hepworth Wakefield. 11 February 2016. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20160128015621/http://www.hepworthwakefield.org/about/history/. 28 January 2016.
    24. Web site: Tate Britain brings Barbara Hepworth out of the shadows and back in focus. Brown. Mark. 19 January 2015. The Guardian. 23 January 2015.
    25. Web site: Barbara Hepworth: Google Doodle celebrates influential English abstract sculptor. Michallon. Clémence. 24 August 2020. The Independent. 25 August 2020.
    26. Web site: 30 October 2020. Barbara Hepworth's time in London marked with blue plaque. 30 October 2020. The Guardian.
    27. Web site: Dame Barbara Hepworth and John Skeaping Sculptors Blue Plaques. 30 October 2020. English Heritage.
    28. Book: Women in abstraction . 2021 . Thames & Hudson Ltd. ; Thames & Hudson Inc . London : New York, New York . 978-0500094372 . 170.
    29. Web site: Barbara Hepworth – Heide . Heide Museum of Modern Art . 22 June 2024 .
    30. Web site: Jinman . Richard . Barbara Hepworth: In Equilibrium exhibition at Heide Museum of Modern Art preview . . 27 October 2022 . 3 November 2022.
    31. Web site: How Barbara Hepworth Became a Modern Master of Sculpture. Cohen. Alina. 9 January 2020. Artsy. 12 January 2020.
    32. Web site: Sun and Moon. artuk.org.
    33. Web site: The Cosdon Head Art UK. artuk.org.
    34. Web site: Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery (UK). https://ghostarchive.org/iarchive/facebook/34806457974/10157150998897975 . 26 February 2022 . limited. www.facebook.com.
    35. Web site: Campus art – Museums and Collections – University of Liverpool . 25 September 2022 . www.liverpool.ac.uk.
    36. Web site: Square Forms Art UK. artuk.org.
    37. Web site: Dame Barbara Hepworth THREE OBLIQUES (WALK-IN). Sotheby's. https://web.archive.org/web/20210525194706/https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2006/impressionist-modern-art-evening-sale-n08195/lot.50.html. 25 May 2021. 25 May 2021.
    38. Web site: Collection. Pier Arts Centre.
    39. Web site: Collection. 11 January 2023. www.lyndensculpturegarden.org.
    40. Web site: Epiduaros II. www.arboretum.umn.edu. 12 May 2020.
    41. Web site: University of Minnesota Landscape Arboretum branches out with art garden. Star Tribune. 12 May 2020.
    42. Web site: Barbara Hepworth – Collection Database . www.kettlesyard.co.uk. 25 August 2020.
    43. Web site: Head (Ra) . AGSA – Online Collection . 6 November 2020.