Dame (Jocelyn) Barbara Hepworth

Other names: Mrs Skeaping

Born 10 January 1903
Died 20 May 1975

Active: 1925 - 1975

Country of birth and death: England

Sculptor

Born Wakefield. She was the daughter of Herbert Raikes Hepworth (1881-1958), civil engineer to the West Riding of Yorkshire. Barbara won a scholarship to Leeds School of Art 1920-21 and then studied at the Royal College of Art between 1921-24. Afterwards she received a travel scholarship to Italy 1924-25, where she met and married John Skeaping 1925. They were divorced in 1931. Her first solo exhibition was at the Beaux Arts Gallery, London 1928. Her work was initially carvings in stone and wood, moving towards total abstraction; her work was cast into bronze from mid-1950s. Member of Seven and Five Society 1931-36, also in Abstraction-Création group and Unit One in 1930s. Moved to St. Ives 1939. First retrospective exhibition in Leeds 1943. Founder-member Penwith Society 1949. 2nd Prize UPP 1953. Grand Prize Sao Paulo Biennal 1959. C.B.E. 1958. D.B.E. 1965. Died in a studio fire, St. Ives, Cornwall.

Commissions include : Contrapuntal forms (later chosen for Harlow public site) and Turning Forms for Festival of Britain 1951; Hatfield Technical College 1951; Theme on Electronics for Mullard House, London 1956; Meridian 1960, State House, Holborn, London, unveiled; Winged Figure 1963 John Lewis, Oxford Street, London.

Exhibitions include : Alex, Reid and Lefevre Gallery, London 1946 (solo); LCC 1948; VB (retrospective) 1950; SB 1951; Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, 1954 (retrospective); LCC 1951, 54, 57, 60, 61; AC 1957, 60, 61; Leeds City Art Gallery 1958; SPB 1959 (Grand Prix).

Collections include: Tate Gallery; British Council; Arts Council; Leeds City Art Galleries; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.

Further reading: D. Thistlewood, (ed.), Barbara Hepworth Reconsidered, Critical Forum Series Volume III, (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press and Tate Gallery, Liverpool, 1996).
P. Curtis and A.G. Wilkinson, Barbara Hepworth, A Retrospective, Tate Gallery, Liverpool, 14 September – 4 December 1994, (Tate Gallery/Art Gallery of Ontario and tour), (exh. cat.).
A.M. Hammacher, Barbara Hepworth, (London: Thames and Hudson, 1968, revised edition, 1987).
B. Hepworth, Barbara Hepworth – A Pictorial Autobiography, (Bath: Adams and Dart, 1970, revised edition prepared under direction of A. Bowness, Bradford-on-Avon: Moonraker Press,1978, reprinted London: Tate Gallery, 1987).
P. Curtis, Barbara Hepworth, (London : Tate Gallery Publishing, 1998).
M. Gale and C. Stephens, Barbara Hepworth, Works in the Tate Gallery Collection and the Barbara Hepworth Museum St. Ives, (London: Tate Gallery, 1999).

Biography from Whiteley (2001) with additional information from Bowness (2004)

Wealth at death: £2,970,049 0s. 0d.
Probate date: 1975

Citing this record

'Dame (Jocelyn) Barbara Hepworth', Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951, University of Glasgow History of Art and HATII, online database 2011 [http://sculpture.gla.ac.uk/view/person.php?id=msib6_1211902424, accessed 21 Mar 2023]