The Secret Art of Dorothy Hepworth AKA Patricia Preece

Please note: we are awaiting a delivery of this item which will be arriving imminently. (01/07/24)

Dorothy Hepworth’s life and work has been overshadowed by her flamboyant life-long partner, Patricia Preece, who bizarrely married Stanley Spencer in 1937 but continued to live with Dorothy in a lesbian relationship. For many decades Dorothy has remained an enigmatic, shadowy, figure – her name only mentioned in passing as Patricia Preece’s ‘friend’ and thus her work as a painter has never received the attention it deserves.

During her lifetime Patricia Preece was highly regarded as an artist by luminaries such as Augustus John, Roger Fry, Duncan Grant, Vanessa Bell and Virginia Woolf amongst others. We now know that this reputation was gained by signing and exhibiting works painted by her partner Dorothy Hepworth.

This fully illustrated monograph is published to coincide with the major exhibition at Charleston Lewes and tells the extraordinary story in detail for the first time.