Dame Barbara Hepworth (1903-1975)
Artist's Resale Right ("Droit de Suite"). Artist's… Read more PROPERTY FROM THE ESTATE OF RENEE L. RUPERT GRANVILLE-GROSSMAN
Dame Barbara Hepworth (1903-1975)

Three oblique forms (February)

Details
Dame Barbara Hepworth (1903-1975)
Three oblique forms (February)
signed, dated and numbered 'Barbara Hepworth/1967 5/9' (on the base)
polished bronze
10½ in. (26.7 cm.) high, including base
This work is recorded as BH442, cast 5.
Provenance
with Laing Galleries, London, May 1968, by whom purchased direct from the artist in 1968.
Purchased by P. Herriot from the above, September 1968.
with New Art Centre, London.
Anonymous sale; Christie's, London, 7 June 1991, lot 367, where purchased by the present owner.
Literature
R. Alley (intro.), exhibition catalogue, Barbara Hepworth Retrospective 1927-67, London, Tate Gallery, 1968, p. 43, no. 177, BH 442, another cast illustrated.
A. Bowness (ed.), The Complete Sculpture of Barbara Hepworth 1960-69, London, 1971, p. 44, no. 442, pl. 162, another cast illustrated.
Exhibition catalogue, Barbara Hepworth, Valencia, IV AM, 2004, p. 187, another cast illustrated.
Exhibited
London, Marlborough Fine Art, Recent Acquisitions, 1967, no. 8, another cast exhibited.
London, Tate Gallery, Barbara Hepworth 1927-67: 186 Sculpture and Drawings, 1968, no. 117, another cast exhibited.
Wakefield, Wakefield Art Gallery, Barbara Hepworth: Polished Bronzes, May - June 2003, number untraced, another cast exhibited: this exhibition travelled to Gouda, Museum Het Catharina and Gasthuis, July - September 2003.
Valencia, IVAM, Barbara Hepworth Retrospective, September - November 2004, number untraced, another cast exhibited.
Special Notice
Artist's Resale Right ("Droit de Suite"). Artist's Resale Right Regulations 2006 apply to this lot, the buyer agrees to pay us an amount equal to the resale royalty provided for in those Regulations, and we undertake to the buyer to pay such amount to the artist's collection agent.

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André Zlattinger
André Zlattinger

Lot Essay

Three oblique forms (February) is part of a group of sculpture that occupied Hepworth in the second half of the 1960s. Several small-scale works were produced and these were subsequently worked up to form monumental sculptures, including Three Oblique Forms (Walk In), Four Square (Walk Through) and Two Forms (Divided Circle). In these table-top sculptures, Hepworth continued to explore the relationship between man and the architectural environment, she was looking for something that the spectator might participate in, inhabit and touch: a reflection of her confrontation with mortality in her fight with cancer in 1965-66. This was certainly achieved through the monumental works, but also on a more intimate scale with the table-top pieces.
Hepworth's intention with these sculptures was to engage the viewer to use the prospects through the circles to frame nature and the world around. By using a highly polished finish to the bronze she was able to reflect, not only the circular holes in other positions on the sculpture, which provide an endlessly different perspective, but also a temptingly tactile jewel-like sculpture.

We are very grateful to Dr Sophie Bowness for her assistance in preparing this catalogue entry. Dr Sophie Bowness is preparing the revised catalogue raisonné of Hepworth's sculpture.

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