Moelwyn Merchant and Barbara Hepworth
An Artistic Kinship
August 31, 2026
During a distinguished academic career as Professor of English at Exeter University, Moelwyn Merchant began to make sculptures in 1964 under the influence and tutelage of his friend Barbara Hepworth who he first met in 1951. Their refined intellectual and artistic kinship flourished until Hepworth's tragic death in 1975. Moelwyn Merchant's friendship with Hepworth deepened during the 1960s when Merchant was able to make frequent trips to St. Ives from Exeter. In his published memoir, Fragments of a Life, he recounted the revelatory impact of the numerous visits to Hepworth's...
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