Barbara Hepworth: Form and Feeling - Retrospectives - Obit Magazine
Small and soft-spoken, Hepworth did not believe you had to be strong or forceful to make sculpture. She explained, “It’s [about] rhythm. The strokes of the hammer on the chisel have to be in time with your heartbeat or pulse.”
By the time Hepworth died 35 years ago, on May 20, 1975, she had executed almost 600 sculptures over 50 years and had been knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 1965. She had little assistance, and her underappreciated sculpture is even confused with Henry Moore’s oeuvre. Because she and Moore, as fledgling artists, shared teachers and then a period style, their art has much in common. Yet it differs in many ways. For one, Hepworth carved many more stone and wood sculptures. She also remained committed to an abstract vocabulary for a longer time.
