Oval Form with Strings

Hepworth's carved wood works with strings are held in several major collections, including the Tate (which holds many of her works at Tate Britain and the Barbara Hepworth Museum in St Ives). To see this specific piece, check the collection page of institutions such as the Tate or the Hepworth Wakefield museum. Loan status and current display vary, so verify with the institution before visiting.

Hepworth was inspired by the taut strings of surgical instruments she saw during a hospital visit in the early 1930s, as well as by mathematical models she encountered. The strings create spatial tension and draw attention to the negative space within and around the carved form. This interest in the interplay of solid and void connects her work to contemporaries like Naum Gabo, who also experimented with string-based constructions.

The work consists of a carved wooden oval body—typically a hardwood—into which taut strings are threaded across interior openings. The combination of organic carved wood and linear string elements is characteristic of several Hepworth works from the late 1930s onward. This contrasts with her later cast-bronze outdoor sculptures.

Both Hepworth and Henry Moore experimented with stringed forms in the 1930s, and both cited mathematical models as a source of inspiration. The two artists were close associates—Moore and Hepworth were central figures in the Hampstead and St Ives modernist circles—and their work from this period shows overlapping interests in abstraction, interior space, and biomorphic form.