joseph scissorhands: Hepworth In Colour

"I am the form and I am the hollow, the thrust and the contour" - Barbara Hepworth.

Paul Laib (1869-1958) - Barbara Hepworth's hands, 1933

This exhibition at the Courtauld really complements the work of fellow contemporary sculptor Henry Moore currently at Kew Gardens (here), with both being sculptors and having studied together at the Royal College of Art early in their careers. Hepworth In Colour showcases some of Barbara Hepworth's (1903–1975) most beautifully tactile pieces, some of which contain carved voids filled with striking colours and pierced by lines of radiating strings. Colour is not necessarily the first thing you would normally associate with Hepworth's work, and this small but brilliant show, the first exhibition to examine Hepworth's use of colour, goes some way to dispelling the notion that her sculptures focused solely on form. Hepworth did apply colour to striking effect onto the interior holes of her circular and curved forms, usually a white in stark contrast to the the warmth and grain of the wood on the exterior, or rich egg-yolk yellow, or deep cobalt blues in contrast to the white plaster surround. Other strong elements of colour were introduced through the vibrant red of the strings piercing her forms. Hepworth began using colour in the 1930s and had visited Mondrian's Parisian studio which may have been instrumental in her primary colour choices for the sculptures. In the first room of the exhibition there are some Mondrianesque pictures featuring arrangements of blocks of colour. The addition of colour for Hepworth was actually a vital element which enhanced the definition of the spatial dimensions and optical effects of the form. Having had to flee London with her young family because of the Second World War, Hepworth arrived in Cornwall, and it was the Cornish landscape and the blue and white of the sea and sky that would provide the inspiration for much of her future work. The display also includes one of Hepworth's oil paint encrusted palettes to underscore the theme of the exhibition. It was amazing to see many of Hepworth's sculptures in the actual which I had never encountered previously. One stand out was the circular wood Pelagos sculpture which echoed the theme of the landscape curling back in on itself like a wave with a series of radiating red strings supporting the crest of the wave. It was also exciting to see for the first time the original geometric drawings and paintings in which she worked out the ideas for the sculptures exhibited here. Many of the drawings were created in the early years of the war when materials were scarce, executed during the night whilst her children slept. She referred to these works as sculptures 'in disguise' as they were crucial to the development of her ideas about colour and its relation to her sculptural forms. She wrote to art critic Herbert Read about the link between her sculptures and drawings stating there was 'the same joy in a line, a form, a colour.' Despite the vivid colours employed in her sculpture and painting Hepworth felt that her use of colour was misconceived by the art world stating 'my colour has been accepted but never understood.' The sculptures and drawings are absolutely marvellous and inspiring stuff for me personally. They along with pieces by Henry Moore (1898-1986) and Naum Gabo (1890-1977) were the inspiration behind my Aeolus series (here) because their forms, to my mind strongly evoke music, and resemble the Aeolian harp, an instrument played by the breeze of the wind. In my pieces the gold, stitched strings are placed in geometric patterns on the outside of the composition encircling the clusters of butterflies. This is in response to curves and radiating intersecting lines of the strings in Hepworth, Moore and Gabo's sculptures and corresponding drawings which map out the geometric beauty of their pieces. Hepworth In Colour is another in an exciting line of recent exhibitions (here, here, and here) held in the small Denise Coates Exhibition Galleries space by the Courtauld's curation team of late. Accompanying the exhibition on the floor below is Hepworth and Nicholson: The Hampstead Studio Photographs, a complementary display of the black and white photographs by Paul Laib (1869-1958), documenting both Hepworth and Nicholson, and their work when they shared a studio together at 7 The Mall, Hampstead. This is an exhibition I shall definitely be visiting again.