If Not Now, When? Generations of Women in Sculpture in Britain, 1960 – 2022

The Hepworth Wakefield
Gallery Walk, Wakefield, West Yorkshire WF1 5AW
31 March 2023 – 15 October 2023
Saatchi Gallery
Duke of York’s HQ, King’s Road, London SW3 4RY
15 November 2023 – 22 January 2024

bad mother

This exhibition presents the outcomes of a significant research project, Hepworth’s Progeny, hosted by The Hepworth Wakefield (2021-23) in collaboration with art historian Griselda Pollock and sculptor Lorna Green. The project generated a survey of women across Britain working in sculpture today and a comparative study with the stories of women who responded to a parallel survey issued by Lorna Green in 1988.

If Not Now, When? Generations of Women in Sculpture in Britain, 1960 – 2022 will invite audiences to consider issues of gender and time in order to suggest new narratives about sculpture by women in Britain during this period, looking at lives, work and social change. Selected from the nearly 320 artists who responded to the 1988 and 2022 surveys, the exhibition will present work by Phyllida Barlow, Glenys Barton, Helen Chadwick, Kim Lim, Veronica Ryan and Shelagh Wakeley, among many others.

Exhibiting Bad Mother, 2013, machine knitted wool and mixed media on maple wood shelf, 780 × 160 × 160 mm. On loan from Private Collection.

Photography: Douglas Atfield

10 October 2023

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