Hepworth sculpture targeted by thieves

A SCULPTURE by artist Barbara Hepworth has been ripped from its plinth in a public park in the latest of a spate of metal thefts.

The bronze work of art, called Two Forms (Divided Circle), was stolen overnight on Monday from Dulwich Park in Southwark, London.

Council staff discovered the theft after the park was unlocked and town hall bosses have offered a £1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the thieves.

The news comes as soaring prices for copper, lead and bronze have seen everything from railway lines, phone lines and even war memorials targeted by thieves.

Hepworth died in a fire at her studio in St Ives, Cornwall, in 1975. Her largest work, a 20ft-high bronze sculpture called Single Form, stands in the United Nations Plaza in New York.