Talk about Barbara Hepworth July 2019

 Talk about Barbara Hepworth,[1903-75],  Porthmeor Studios, St.Ives, Cornwall, UK  25th July 2019.

Sara Matson drawn by Mary Fletcher

Sara Matson gave a lively illustrated talk to a crowded room at the renovated Porthmeor studios, near to the famous Hepworth Garden of sculpture and the Museum now in the house where the sculptor lived.

The Hepworth marble sculpture ‘Magic Stone’ which belongs to the Penwith Gallery in her beloved St.Ives, is being lent to the Rodin Museum in Paris for a large show of her work from November this year to March 2020.

It seems Hepworth’s reputation is gaining much interest worldwide as a pioneer of Modernist, abstract, direct carving, unlike Rodin, who used modelling and casting.

We saw slides of the plans for the show and were invited to see Hepworth’s place in art history and her work’s special qualities as it developed.

Shirley Beck, in the audience, who knew Barbara, was able to tell us how Hepworth campaigned successfully to stop the St.Ives’ cobbled Fore Street being tarmacked and to stop the Island promontory of grass and rocks being entirely made into a car park. Hepworth welcomed children climbing on her sculptures, which are now usually protected from touch except where, as in St.Ives, they are out in public spaces as Barbara gave two to the town.

These aspects of Barbara Hepworth as local to St.Ives and yet known globally were interestingly juxtaposed.