Barbara Hepworth - Drawings

We went the other day to the Barbara Hepworth show at the Tate. There were lots of beautiful familiar pieces - I particularly loved the huge guarea wood pieces with their beautiful nut-like polished exteriors and their chalky lime-washed textured interiors.

Perhaps what struck me most though were the drawings - most of which I had never seen before. I found these studies of surgeons at work really extraordinary. They were made just after the war, when Hepworth had befriended the surgeon Norman Caponer who had treated Hepworth and Nicholson's daughter. 

I really love all the scratchy grainy textures in the drawings - for me they have much of the quality of the chalky textures in Hepworth's carving. 

There is a great article by Jonathan Jones from 2012 about the drawings in which he draws the comparison between these and the paintings of Piero della Francesca. You can read the article on the Guardian website here:

http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2012/oct/24/barbara-hepworth-hospital-drawings