Barbara Hepworth and The Tonsillectomy

AbstractThe Garnett Passe and Rodney Williams Foundation, a major medical research foundation in Melbourne, has recently acquired a hitherto unknown and uncatalogued painting by Dame Barbara Hepworth, the celebrated British sculptor and artist. It is of the Foundation's nominal patron Garnett Passe performing a tonsillectomy, probably at the London Clinic, in 1948. This article gives an account of Barbara Hepworth and her relationships with Garnett Passe and Norman Capener, the two surgeons who introduced her to this subject and who led to the creation of this unique work of art.