Wieneke Archive Book 4i : Art - General Presscuttings

AU picture, by cou.ft , of the orthf "GROW. I (CoNcouasE)": Marble sculpture by Barbara Hepworth I sculpture and are nd the schools. are ..toss lively interest are drawing gene- t:, There is a world .vicen seeing an twig- s color reproduction. a t.d to be a sculptor. wed with my father .t Riding of York- s -es every landscape .ire. I had to be a I had to use my at image. 1 rather g an image mentally s is a special faculty. onceives his compo- te end in space and for sees in his mind t. all the way round, background was The paradox of industrial towns .the magnificent 4 Riding, made one edity about the Iv- an to his environ- g;tity and beauty of which can trots- uonment and harsh tins. To me a basic pture is to express n man and his fun- k- th nature. Gesture, whether in hu- in nature, are of i.teen I was fortu- win a scholarship out of Art I did not Itarmony with the nil methods of tui- ccept discipline be- eep my scholarship. spent there wasted. tdous amount about amy and structure, I not put the knowl- al use. chool of Art in Lon- ny next scholarship her the war, there sly vital movement. people like myself, from school, there were fully formed students hack from the war on army grants. Sev- eral of these proved to be major art- ists, among them Henry Moore. We made quite a group who really helped and sustained one another. We had a clear idea of our goal. But I do not think we were in any way aggressive. A A A A Traveling Scholarship to Italy was enormously important. Neither in Yorkshire nor in London had I really appreciated the relationship of light, of moon or sun. to forms. In the strong Italian light the subtleties of form, color and contour were in- tensified. I spent my entire year looking at and studying painting, architecture and sculpture, in rela- tion to light. I also studied the tra- ditional ways of carving marble, a stone not native to England. Once more I was in disgrace. Instead of coming back with traditional works, I did not produce a single piece. But that year et .looking--inul..nlakltlL'.1- has remained a constant inspiration. Much later, in 1954, I went to Greece. There was no money to go earlier. Greece more than fulfilled my greatest hopes. There I found the extraordinary light which I had dis- covered in Cornwall. I also found the philosophical relationship be- tween man and his landscape, an un- derstanding and harmony. a main- tenance of the spirit which gives power to form. Form as an affirma- tive image is really the tactile as well as the visual, concrete, embodi- ment of man's poise in relation to the universe. In 1930 I turned away from real- ism because I was a carver and be- lieved in ''direct" carving, that is in working straight into the block. When I found that I could thus carve freely, make forms which expressed my feelings, but which bore no reJ lation to anything but my own idea* about life itself, I realized that the whole conception and harmony of the idea was of paramount impor- tance. When in 1931 I pierced my first piece, I remember the great joy it gave me to find the depth and re- sulting expansion of the form and of rgj Plane wood with color, by Barbara Hepworth the light entering it. I had achieved a complete sentae of freedom for my own calligraphy. In a foreword to the catalog for an exhibition of my work in 1937, Professor J. D. Bernal likened some of my sculptures to the ancient stones and cromlechs of Cornwall. But at that time I had not been to Cornwall. When, just before the war, I came here to live, the Cornish landscape linked up so many of my earlier convictions that it fused for me my childhood in Yorkshire with the inspiration of the light and philosophies of Italy and Greece. In the sculpture "Three Forms (Winter Rocks)," the stones are reminiscent of the groups of stone scattered about the moors, o a group of figures on the beaches. "Group I. Concourse," carved in marble, imagines the movement of a group of people corn- municating with one another in a state of stability and understanding. A A A To me one of the most exciting things about present-day sculpture is the expansion of the sculptural idea in the entirely visionary con- ceptions, in Oil use of many different materials. In addition to stone. bronze and wood, sculptors now work in cement, slate, copper, steel glass and even plastics. Just as the Italian Primitives, by their percep- tive use of the very colors one now experiences on a jet flight, expressed their ideas of heavenly beauty, so I feel that contemporary sculptors are unconsciously realizing the affirma- tive images which our present so- ciety needs if it is to come to grips with the extraordinary developments in science and in space; if it is to meet the uneasy sense that we may not be able to hold our own. It seems to me that the post -was difficulties which architects have had to meet (the current sense of dan- ger) have produced in them, and in some artists, a trend toward a short- term policy, a pessimistic outlook, But I do feel that this can be over- come. indeed is now being overcome. The issue may well depend on the attitudes we adopt. Are we going to be rich. rich that is in ideas, or are we going to be obsessed by the fear - of being poor materially? In the ex- pression of ideas there is no limita- tion. I believe most strongly that any sculpture made now should be valid in its form and ideas a thousand years hence. A sculpture should be an act of praise, an enduring expres- sion of the divine spirit. BARBARA HEPWORTH The three previous articles in this series appeared on April 13, May 25, and June 22. The next article, by , Victor de Panic, trill appear in August. An article on Dante Barbara and her work appears in the Arts and Entertainment columns of this edi- tion. Christi.iit Science, which Mary Baker Eddy discovered and founded, is in complete accord with the Bible. This statement, for example, occurs in her hook "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 254): "Pilgrin. on earth, thy 1 :his holy query. It could have implied, in substance, Where do your thoughts find rest? Where do you live in consciousncs,? With whom do you make your abode? In whose household have you found that peace which we now seek and which we ask to share with you? Jesus knew well that it was the Christ, which he embodied, that had drawn these men unto him. He recognized the necessity of satisfy- ing their spiritual need for a higher habitation of consciousness. Not matter, but Mind, God, the Father. must meet their need. Where God dwells, there dwells His beloved son also. The material world cannot contain the infinite One and only, but this One, this All, can and does include all ideas, which are imparted by Him and known to Him. For the Master to comprehend the fact that man is one with God as His reflection was for him to see that in reality he, too, was a portion of this holy household. A A A 1110 is. an gence apart from matter? Am I liv- ing in the poverty of materiality or among the riches of God's grace?" The Master vommitted Ins life to God. his Parent. He trusted this Parent implicitly to care for each human need. Though Jesus had little materially, yet because of the very absence of reliance on matter. he was free to live in Spirit. The flesh, or matter. weighs against Spirit, and to be released from dependence on matter even in a measure is to be abundantly rewarded by additional signs of Love's provision for all of its be- loved children. A A A The writer has spent many years in different countries - traveling by ship and plane. living in houses and apartments. He has observed evidences of this divine law, namely, that whenever his thought dwelt on God's supremacy in earth as in heaven, the human require- ment of a place to stay was quickly and fully met. He has noted, too, that with a gradually improved concept of this law has come a permanent sense of home. Mrs. Eddy writes in "Pulpit and Press" (p. 3), "Our surety is in our con- fidence that we are indeed dwellers in Truth and Love, man's eternal mansion." "CURVED STONE WITH YELLOW": By Barbara Hepworth 'File Sumerian found in his art In the field of art. the Sumerians were particularly noted for their skill in sculpture. The earliest sculptors tended to be abstract and impression- istic. Their temple statues show great emotional and spiritual inten- sity rather than skill in modeling. This came gradually. 110WeVer, and the later sculptors were technically superior. although their images lost in inspiration and vigor Sumerian sculptors were quite skillful in carving figures on steles and plaques and even on vases and bowls. It is from this sculpture that All the while we moved We thought we stopped, and all the while we moved. Still as the bayberry went from green to gray we took the step we had been talking ol. Some finger slipped us from our soundless groove, some tongue urged what we could not hear it say. We thought we stopped. and all the while we moved like pears gold -going through a pungent grove. In time commuted as sweet grass gone 'hay, we took the step we had been talking of for years. And on that hour when lightning stove our late location in. we were well away who thought we'd stopped. All earthly while, we'd moved nut of the aim of danger like the dove which looks a hawk, so free it swoops. To slay, we took the step we had been talking of. O blest o modest motion -- %%,is it love? - which made our breath keep toady past the we thought it stopped. All. all the while it moved we took the step we had been talking 01'. NORMA lAnssa we learn a good deal about Sumerian appearance and dress. The men either were clean shaven or wore long beards and long hair parted in the middle. The most com- mon form of dress was a kind of flounced skirt, over which long cloaks of felt were sometimes worn. Later the chiton, or long skirt, took the place of the flounced skirt. Cov- ering the skirt was a big fringed shawl, which was carried over the left shoulder. leaving the right arm free. Women often wore dresses which looked like long tufted shawls, covering them from head to foot and leaving only the right shoulder bare. Their hair was usually parted in the twiddle and braided into a heavy pig- tail, which was then wound around the head. They often wore elaborate headdresses consisting of hair rib- bons, beads. and pendants. Music, both instrumental and vo- cal, played a large role in Sumerian life. and some of the musicians were important figures in the temples and court. Beautifully constructed harps and lyres were excavated in the royal tombs of Ur. Percussive In- struments, such as the drum and tambourine, were also common, es were pipes of reed and metal. Poetry and song flourished in the Sumerian schools. Most of the recovered works are hymns to gods and kings for use in the temple and palace; but there is every reason to believe that too. sic, song. and dance were a major source of entertainment in the home and market place. - From -The Sumerians: Their History. Culture, and Character," by Samuel Ninth Kramer. Copyright. 1963, by The University of Chicago. The Univer city of Chicago Press, Chicago, Ill.