The Hepworth Wakefield is presenting an exhibition of 25 works personally selected by Tim Sayer MBE, who has been collecting art for more than 50 years – 30 of them with his wife, Annemarie Norton. The Collector Curates will include a selection from their collection, alongside works from The Hepworth Wakefield’s Permanent Art Collection and a small number of loans. On display will be paintings, prints, drawings and sculptures by artists such as Anthony Caro, Prunella Clough, Barbara Hepworth and Antoni Taples.
For Tim, curating this exhibition has revealed some unexpected and fascinating relationships between works from his collection and those from the gallery. An area of focus will be drawing and gestural mark making, both of which are themes throughout Tim’s collected works. Tim commented: ‘When looking at the Reg Butler sculpture and the Stanley William Hayter print side by side, it becomes apparent that an abundance of ‘drawn’ lines ties both together visually.’
The exhibition includes Barbara Hepworth’s very first lithograph, made in 1958, recently given to the gallery by Stanley Jones MBE of the Curwen Studio, where Hepworth made two suites of graphic works. This particular lithograph contains Hepworth’s fingerprint.
The Collector Curates builds on the exhibition in 2016 of around 100 works from Tim and Annemarie’s collection in celebration of their decision to leave the entire collection to The Hepworth Wakefield. They have since donated 52 works to the gallery as a lifetime gift. These are now all online for visitors to browse through: www.hepworthwakefield.org/support-us/legacies/tim-sayer-s-bequest
The couple visited The Hepworth Wakefield for the first time in July 2015. Tim — a former BBC Radio 4 newswriter, said: ‘We were amazed by David Chipperfield’s remarkable building with its sequence of ten beautifully-lit gallery spaces, and we realised that it would be the perfect home for our collection.’ This generosity was widely acknowledged when Tim was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List 2017, for services to Art and Philanthropy.
The Hepworth Wakefield is an award-winning art gallery in the heart of Yorkshire, set within Wakefield’s historic waterfront, overlooking the River Calder. Designed by the acclaimed David Chipperfield Architects, the gallery opened in May 2011 and has already welcomed over 1.8 million visitors and been awarded Museum of the Year 2017. Named after Barbara Hepworth, one of the most important artists of the 20th century who was born and brought up in Wakefield, the gallery presents major exhibitions of the best international modern and contemporary art. It also is home to Wakefield’s art collection – an impressive compendium of modern British and contemporary art – and has dedicated galleries exploring Hepworth’s art and working process.
The Hepworth Wakefield is funded by Wakefield Council and Arts Council England.
THE COLLECTOR CURATES Hepworth Wakefield 4 AUGUST 2017 – 7 JANUARY 2018