About this 3D model

Title Cantate Domino (O Sing unto the Lord) Artist Barbara Hepworth (1903-1975) Date 1958 Medium Bronze Dimensions 2095 x 530 x 505 mm Accession # t00956 (Tate) Credit Presented by the artist, 1967. Cast 6/6 The title, Cantate Domino ('O Sing unto the Lord'), indicates the overtly religious nature of thissculpture. This fits with a wider pattern in Barbara Hepworth's work in the 1950s, associated with both personal and public issues, and was made manifest in the rising form of the sculpture.Cantate Domino is based on two diamond shapes formed in depth by flat planes so that they are open front and back. The structure of the lower diamond is more bulky and compressed, while the top of the upper diamond opens out at the points. The composition almost exactly matches the slightly shorter Ascending Form (Gloria), 1958 (BH 239, artist's estate, repr. Hodin 1961, pl.239), which has an additional back plate (pierced by a circle) sealing the upper form. The sculpture was made for casting following Hepworth's established method of constructing an armature in expanded aluminium. This allowed for the production of the flat independent planes to which the plaster was applied. Brian Wall, who was an assistant of Hepworth's at the time, recalled that the outline was established first, then the inner strip passing between the diamonds, and finally the deep U-shape between the upper arms (interview with the author, 3 May 1996). A cast was made at the Art Bronze Foundry in Fulham and exhibited in 1958; further casting was underway in March 1959 (invoice, 10 March 1959, TGA 965). The inner strip was joined to the left hand side in the process of casting; according to Wall, Hepworth was unhappy about the closure of this gap (interview, 3 May 1996). The weight of the upper section caused structural problems. A welded joint at the waist of one copy (1/6) was found to be broken on arrival for Hepworth's first New York exhibition in late 1959 (letter Hepworth to Peter Gimpel, 24 Sept. 1959, TGA 965); this seems to have been the same cast which required repair at the foundry on its return from the British Artist Craftsmen exhibition which toured America (letter from Hepworth's secretary, Margaret Moir, to Peter Gimpel, 27 April 1961, TGA 965). Brian Wall also recalled repairing a cast (interview, 3 May 1996). The artist's copy, which came to the Tate, spent eight years in the studio garden (1959-67). It has a chalky surface over brown, possibly a result of the oxidisation of the bronze or of Hepworth's reputed use of sour milk in order to achieve a white patination (Tate Gallery Conservation Report). Several commentators have remarked on the thrust of the composition. Michael Shepherd wrote that: the resilience of the metal, and the organic spring which recalls the uncurling tendrils from a seed, unite with the upwards stretch like that of upstretched open hands. Thus a multiplicity of references from figurative associations, together with the work's own essential and abstractnature, come together to form an independent spiritual unity. (Shepherd 1963, [p.39]) This figurative interpretation was also taken up by Mullins. He calls it 'even more exultant' thanAscending Form, (Gloria), adding that they 'represent a free stylisation of the human hand raised in supplication and praise' ('Barbara Hepworth', Barbara Hepworth Exhibition 1970, exh. cat., Hakone Open-Air Museum, Japan 1970, unpag.). In this way the reflected forms may evoke hands in prayer, such as those in Albrecht Dürer's famous Study of Hands, 1508 (Albertina, Vienna, repr. Walter L. Strauss, The Complete Drawings of Albrecht Dürer, vol.2: 1500-1509, New York 1972, p.1033). Although Hepworth herself did not specify such a literal interpretation, Mullins's assessment - culled from conversations with her - does reflect her general view of the spirituality of her work and sculpture in general. Writing to Herbert Read of the sculptures in the British Museum, she asserted: 'Only a society in a state of affirmation can produce sculpture - a primitive society or one fighting for its existence ... on the basis of active belief in both the virility of nature & the spiritual ascendancy of man' (18 Jan. 1953, Sir Herbert Read Archive, University of Victoria, B.C.). The latter she equated with 'a religious sensibility', adding: 'In an art [sculpture] which is intrinsically bound up with the understanding of natural forces, & an art which depends on virility of life & movement even for its comprehension, you have to look for a dynamic inter-play in society itself' (ibid.). Such an understanding of sculpture, as resulting from the conjunction of social and spiritual energies in a period of crisis while drawing on the latent forces of nature, was central to Hepworth's faith in the relevance of art. This confidence was strengthened in adversity, as she later told Mullins that outside events supplied 'the moral climate in which my sculpture is produced' ('Barbara Hepworth', Barbara Hepwor