A fundraising campaign aiming to raise nearly £3 million is underway to prevent a Barbara Hepworth masterpiece from being sold to a private collector and leaving the United Kingdom. Art Fund, a charity that supports the acquisition of art for public collections and provides financial support to museums and the Hepworth Wakefield, is working to keep the piece “Sculpture with Colour (Deep Blue and Red)” within the UK.
Created by Hepworth during the Second World War while residing in Cornwall with her then-husband, Ben Nicholson, the sculpture was sold at auction by Christie’s in March for £3.8 million. The UK government has placed an export restriction on the sculpture, allowing institutions until August to match the sum offered by the private buyer who intends to take it abroad. Art Fund has already contributed £750,000, but an additional £2.9 million needs to be raised by the deadline of August 27.
Eleanor Clayton, a senior curator at the Hepworth Wakefield and a specialist on Barbara Hepworth, emphasized the importance of keeping the artist’s work in the UK for future generations. The sculpture, representative of Hepworth’s most renowned wooden, string-carved artworks, is one of the earliest examples of her distinctive style.
Hepworth, a leading British sculptor, created the piece during wartime challenges, including her struggle to obtain the necessary permits to use wood for her art. The strings in the sculpture, according to Hepworth, symbolized the tension she experienced between herself and her surroundings in Cornwall, where she worked until her death in a fire in 1975.
The BBC has reported on the fundraising efforts and added more context about Barbara Hepworth, her significance as a 20th-century British sculptor, and the difficulties she faced during World War II.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2025/jun/05/barbara-hepworth-sculpture-with-colour-deep-blue-and-red-fundraising
