Page 92 - Studio International - July August 1975

group in England. In 1939, Andre's calm and reticent pattern
before the war started, Barbara, of hexagrams was built up of
Obituaries Ben Nicholson and their Belgium metal strips from Pour's
triplets moved to St. Ives in printing workshop, a neat
Cornwall where she has lived ever solution. Beuys produced a
since. Je / nous resonant wall of felt made up
Barbara Hepworth In 1931 Barbara Hepworth Musée d'Ixelles, Brussels, from the leftovers of his 10,000
J. P. Hodin writes: produced the first pierced 23 May - 13 July. Documenta bags, topping it with
sculpture in England. Among her iron and balancing this with a
Barbara Hepworth's life has Circus event: Saltoarte,
ended in a tragedy. She was monumental works are Vertical Ixelles, Brussels, 23 May pile of copper that exhausted the
found, too late to be rescued, on Forms, 1951, commissioned for reserves of northern Europe, the
the 20th of May in her burning Hatfield Technical College, Slung across the Big Top was a whole loomed over by a silent
smoke-filled studio in St. Ives, Hertfordshire; Monolith banner slogan that read: Pour felt loudspeaker and called
trapped by an arthritic (Empyrean), 1953, (London changer l'art it faut changer Fond IV. Charlier the Belgian
condition of her legs which County Council); Theme on l'homme. The event was a grand art-cartoonist went to town with
a roomful of comments on the
Electronics, 1956, commissioned
developed after she broke a hip for Mullard House, London; and circus to mark the opening of a art ratrace suggesting that far
in 1969 on her return from the major showing of the
from being a question of
Scilly Islands. Her life was Meridian ,1958/59, commissioned international avant-garde in the je/nous, the reality is closer to a
for State House, Holborn,
heroic, not only because of her London. In 1959 she visited New quietest backwater of Brussels,
participation in the work of that York for the first time; 1962 saw and true to the nature, or maybe crowd of in-fighting crabs
(French equivalent for too many
group of artists which her Winged Figure for John the ambition, of such occasions,
established modern English art Lewis, London and 1963 her the Burgomeister of Ixelles had in one space, analogous to the
on an international scale against already had cause for complaint. proverbial English tin of
the resistance and lack of monument for Dag This time the statutory sample of sardines). The same dark hints
turned up in Douglas Huebler's
Hammerskiöld, Single Form.
support of their contemporaries, censorship without which no
but also because her spirit was Further visits to New York international convene is complete submission: the suggestion of an
elaborate tug-of-war over canvas
followed in 1963 and 19E4.
strong and courageous, defying had eluded Daniel Buren's red
for years the after-effects of an Among the monumental works stripes and Hans Haacke's to be waged between artists in the
of the last decade of her life are
operation for cancer. Until the picture provenance, and been circus. It was not.
last moment she was active, the 9 bronzes of The Family of awarded to Klaus Staeck's It's difficult enough anyway
Man and the 6 bronzes forming
planning new works, poster of a Belgian policeman to see these large mixed shows as
nurturing new sculptural ideas the Conversation with Magic about his business - the show agents of change. If anything
Stones (1973). Apart from her
and preparing, alas her last, could begin. they provide the artist with the
retrospective exhibition in Zurich sculptural work - in the The exhibition was organized chance to do his own thing
which will open in August of this beginning of her career hand by the alternative newspaper within a defined limit. The limit
year. Barbara Hepworth's carved in stone or hard wood, Pour, and the forty artists were is tacitly accepted in most of the
importance lies in her stressing later also works in metal, and cast selected by the collective of work, whether it be the inverted
of the Greek tradition in the in bronze - there is also an Pour, Jean Coquelet the curator female fetishes exposed by
cultural heritage of Britain, a impressive oeuvre of oil paintings, of the Musée d'Ixelles and Annette Messager, the overt
counterweight to the romantic gouaches and coloured Harald Szeeman, who was sloganizing of Immendorf, or the
trend so predominant in England, lithographs. noticable by his absence. The menacing pyrotechnics of
even in the work of Henry When I saw her last at Easter theme of the show was to be the P. A. Hubert. As a show
Moore, who from the beginning 1975 she was in good spirits, questioning of the relationship dedicated to the theme of the
tended towards a dynamic, although frail: some wonderful between the artist, society and his relationship between art/society/
organic conception arising out of pieces of white Carrara marble public, hence the title: `je/nous'. public, `je/nous' reinforced the
the neo-romantic surrealist had just arrived and she was All works were for sale, and all notion that since art is still an
movement. contemplating the shape they participating artists had agreed activity carried out by
Barbara Hepworth was born would adopt. Only one of them that part of the proceeds of sales individuals, there can be no one
on the 10th January, 1903 in has been started since then, would go to help the running of `right' style 'for the people'. The
Wakefield, Yorkshire. In 1920 started and left unfinished in her Pour. The most worried man was most constructive challenge is the
she won a scholarship to the open-air workshop adjoining that Monsieur Coquelet who had contrast and variety of ideas and
Leeds School of Art; in 1921 studio where she died surrounded probably not anticipated the approaches it can encompass.
she entered the Royal College by the sculptures which made tensions that build up among That's where the circus came
of Art in London where in 1924 her garden into a sculptor's artists, or their difficulties in into its own. Curiously enough
she received her Diploma. In the forest and only a few yards from getting hammer and nails together, the power of its associations as a
same year she travelled in Italy, the 'Palais' which housed what or the desultory nature of highly disciplined form of
concentrating particularly on might be called a Barbara some of the work. By the time of liberty, the blending of fun and
Florence, and in 1925 she Hepworth Museum in the heart the opening his collection of menace that makes circus the
married the sculptor John of St. Ives, the town which nineteenth-century Belgian art magic form it is, showed many of
Skeaping. They had a son who honoured her by making her a had been fairly well shuffled the artists in a new light.
was killed in action with the Freeman in 1968. She was an around to make room for more of Performing artists replaced
R.A.F. in 1953. In 1931 Barbara optimist throughout her hard `je/nous'. James Lee Byars's performing animals, and learnt
Hepworth joined the 'Seven and working life and believed in Golden Column had got itself maybe how difficult it is to be an
Five Group' and met her humanity in spite of all the evil firmly placed in a historical artiste as opposed to an artist.
second husband Ben Nicholson forces which challenge it, position behind Rodin's fighting Perfect timing, brevity,
with whom she visited Paris in particularly materialism. When 1 cherubs, and the Düsseldorf unexpectedness and the ability
1932. Meetings in Paris with think my way back to 1946 when Szene were safely tucked away " to leave the audience wanting
Picasso, Braque, Brancusi and I first met her in Carbis Bay, her round a corner beyond the just that bit more are what my
Sophie Taeuber-Arp were of former residence, and to our seascapes. As it turned out the mother in her capacity as clown
decisive importance to her. In conversations throughout the public of Ixelles took it all calmly qualifies as the essentials of
1934 she became a member of the years in connection with my and there were more volunteers good circus. A handful of artists
`Unit One' group in London. studies on her and the biography prepared to clamber on to had it just right, but many
The publication of the same on which we worked together Byars's perilous Golden Column lacked the discipline and fell
name was a collective effort to for a considerable time, I can for a moment of prominence than short of the ultimate.
establish a modern style in England. hardly suppress the sorrow there were Tate visitors willing to Part of the enchantment of
In 1935 she met Mondrian and which fills my heart. But thinking mount Manzoni's relatively safe circus as opposed to theatre or
Naum Gabo in Paris and in 1936 of what Sappho said to her base for living sculpture. - exhibitions is that the acts that
Miró and Calder in daughter when dying: In the main the artists invited fail pass by as if seen by the
Varengeville; in the same year 'It would be wrong for us. It is were either those known as unfocused eye and leave the
she met Arp in London. In 1937 not right for mourning to `politically motivated', or those whole unspoiled, as every good
`Circle' was published in which enter a home of poetry' who make regular appearances in ringmaster knows. On this
Barbara Hepworth took an I and all her friends can find shows of conceptual and occasion there was no
active part together with Ben satisfaction in the thought that narrative art. Some were ringmaster, plenty of confusion,
Nicholson, Naum Gabo and the her life was fulfilled and her aim represented with work already on and several acts that passed
architect Leslie Martin. 'Circle' achieved. its way out of Belgian leaving no trace on the memory.
was the manifesto of modern collections. Others But the acts that seemed
architecture and the non- adapted materials to hand to memorable really were, and hit
figurative and constructivist their personal hallmark: Carl on that combination of
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