The remaining personal papers of Barbara Hepworth
1920s–1990
These papers contain the remaining personal papers of Barbara Hepworth and include; a large amount of personal correspondence; some professional correspondence; professional papers, that comprise the artist's own records of her drawings and lithographs; personal papers, that include posters, birthday cards, music books, and financial and legal records.
- Collection Owner
- Dame Barbara Hepworth 1903–1975
- Collection
- Tate Archive
- Acquisition
- Presented by the Barbara Hepworth Estate, January 2013.
- Reference
- TGA 20132
43 objects in this collection
- Title
- Correspondence and publications regarding the commission ‘Single Form’ for the United Nations
- Date
- 25 December 1956–25 October 1973
- Description
- 'Single Form' is Barbara Hepworth's largest work at 21 feet high, and her most significant commission. Hepworth was friends with the second United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld, he admired her work and borrowed several sculptures for his office in the UN building. Hammarskjöld was killed in a plane crash in Africa in 1961. The Jacob and Hilda Blaustein Foundation then commissioned Hepworth to create a sculpture in his memory, and she designed 'Single Form' (based on a smaller work of the same name made in 1961). The sculpture was unveiled in June 1964 outside the UN headquarters in New York.
There is a large amount of correspondence regarding the commission from the UN, with the Jacob and Hilda Blaustein Foundation, and with the Morris Singer Foundry who cast the sculpture. There are some publications concerning the unveiling ceremony, plans of the work, and photographs of 'Single Form'. - Reference
- TGA 20132/2/1
