Dorothy Mary Hepworth (30 September 1894 – 8 September 1978) was a British painter and the life partner of

Patricia Preece Patricia Preece, Lady Spencer (22 January 1894 – 19 May 1966), born Ruby Vivian Preece, was an English artist, associated with the Bloomsbury Group, and the second wife of painter Stanley Spencer, for whom she modelled. It was later discovered ...

. Hepworth signed Preece's name to many of Hepworth's paintings, even after Preece's death.

Early life

Hepworth was born in 1894 in

Leicester Leicester ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city, Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest settlement in the East Midlands. The city l ...

, Leicestershire, the oldest of two daughters of Adela ''née'' Jarvis (1865–1954) and Alfred James Hepworth (1859–1930), the owner of a hosiery warehouse. She also had a younger brother, Eric Pachley Hepworth (1897–1898). She met Patricia Preece at the

Slade School of Fine Art The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as ...

in 1917, and graduated from there with first class honours in 1919. The two became lovers. While still a student, Hepworth began exhibiting her work. After graduation, she spent four years with Preece in Paris, where Hepworth studied at the

Académie Colarossi The Académie Colarossi (1870–1930) was an art school in Paris founded in 1870 by the Italian model and sculptor Filippo Colarossi. It was originally located on the Île de la Cité, and it moved in 1879 to 10 rue de la Grande-Chaumière in the ...

and Preece was a pupil of

André Lhote André Lhote (5 July 1885 – 24 January 1962) was a French Cubist painter of figure subjects, portraits, landscapes and still life. He was also active and influential as a teacher and writer on art. Early life and education Lhote was born ...

. They returned to England in 1925, where they relocated to

Cookham Cookham is a historic River Thames, Thames-side village and civil parishes in England, civil parish on the north-eastern edge of Berkshire, England, north-north-east of Maidenhead and opposite the village of Bourne End, Buckinghamshire, Bourne ...

for Hepworth's health. The two received financial help from Hepworth's wealthy father to purchase a house there, but Hepworth's father lost his fortune in the stock market crash of 1929. Hepworth's father died in 1930, and afterwards Hepworth and Preece experienced difficulty making the mortgage payments on their home. Preece and Hepworth were

closeted ''Closeted'' and ''in the closet'' are metaphors for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender and other (LGBTQ+) people who have not disclosed their sexual orientation or gender identity and aspects thereof, including sexual identity and human ...

about their relationship as was common at that time, and sometimes claimed to be sisters.

Career

It is believed that many, if not all, of the much-accoladed paintings of Preece were created by Hepworth. Preece attributed the paintings to herself, with the consent of Hepworth, who was shy and preferred not to appear in public. Hepworth's work attributed to Preece was exhibited in London at the

Royal Academy of Arts The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its purpo ...

, the Warren Gallery, Maddox Street, in 1928 and the

Lefevre Gallery The Lefevre Gallery (or The Lefevre Galleries) was an art gallery in London, England, operated by Alex. Reid & Lefevre Ltd. The gallery was opened at 1a, King Street, St James's, in 1926, when rival art dealers Alexander Reid and Ernest Lefe ...

, King Street, in 1936. Some of the paintings were purchased by

Kenneth Clark Kenneth Mackenzie Clark, Baron Clark (13 July 1903 – 21 May 1983) was a British art historian, museum director, and broadcaster. After running two important art galleries in the 1930s and 1940s, he came to wider public notice on television ...

Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf was born i ...

and

Augustus John Augustus Edwin John (4 January 1878 – 31 October 1961) was a Welsh painter, draughtsman, and etcher. For a time he was considered the most important artist at work in Britain: Virginia Woolf remarked that by 1908 the era of John Singer Sarg ...

, among others. Until 1996, it was believed that the two collaborated on many of the works. Evidence for Hepworth's creating them herself comes from diaries that the two shared, where Preece admits to having had little hand in the creation of the paintings.

Later life and death

Hepworth and Preece maintained their relationship after Preece's 1937 marriage to the painter

Stanley Spencer Sir Stanley Spencer, CBE RA (30 June 1891 – 14 December 1959) was an English painter. Shortly after leaving the Slade School of Art, Spencer became well known for his paintings depicting Biblical scenes occurring as if in Cookham, the small ...

, who was obsessed with Preece. Preece took Hepworth on the honeymoon, while Spencer stayed at home working on a painting. Preece and Hepworth continued to live together during the marriage to Spencer, and after Preece gained control of Spencer's finances they evicted him from his house in 1938 to rent it out. Preece refused to divorce her hapless husband. Hepworth remained Preece's companion and lover until the latter's death in 1968 at the age of 74. Hepworth continued to paint and still signed her work as Preece until her own death in 1978. In her will Hepworth left £32,268. Hepworth and Preece are buried in Cookham churchyard beneath a common memorial.Dorothy Hepworth
UK and Ireland, Find a Grave Index, 1300s–Current – Ancestry.com

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hepworth, Dorothy 20th-century English painters Alumni of the Slade School of Fine Art 1894 births 1978 deaths English LGBT people 20th-century LGBT people