Semi-derelict and out of use for almost 50 years following the death of Barbara Hepworth in 1975, the former dance hall in which the artist created some of her best known works is set to reopen as an exhibition, learning, event and community space, the latest addition to Tate’s St Ives portfolio.
The Palais de Danse on Barnoon Hill in the Cornish coastal town was bought by Hepworth in 1961, and used as a second studio for the monumental works that characterised her output as her international reputation grew. Among the works she created there were Single Form (1961-64), Winged Figure (1961-62) and Four Square (Walk Through) (1966), the latter of which is on display at the Barbara Hepworth Museum and Sculpture Garden across the road. Like the museum, which was donated to the Tate in 1980, the Palais was presented to the Tate by the artist’s family in 2015, and together the sites preserve the locations of Hepworth’s work from 1949 to 1975.
Now cleared of the artist’s accumulated materials, the Palais retains enough evidence of Hepworth’s time there to have been granted Grade II-listed status. A mezzanine floor was added to the lower studio by Hepworth, so that she could use the former warehouse to work at height, while the upper studio retains the chequerboard floor with which she created the armature for Single Form. Overlaid with augmented reality projections, this floor will form the basis of a permanent exhibition charting the creation of Single Form, and elucidating Hepworth’s practice in a way that has until now been impossible in the small spaces of the museum.
Bigger project
In addition to making the building safe and accessible, preserving the traces of Hepworth’s activities at the Palais is a key component of a capital project costing £8m, of which £2.8m has been granted by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, with further support received from sources including The Headley Trust, The Bowness Family, The Hepworth Estate, The Porthmeor Fund and The Bridget Riley Art Foundation.
The location of the Palais on one of St Ives’s narrow and impossibly steep thoroughfares, often clogged with traffic, inevitably raises questions about the wisdom of adding another visitor attraction to a town already struggling with overtourism. Andrew Mitchell, an independent local councillor and Tate St Ives Advisory Board member, acknowledges that the museum’s relationship with the town has not always run smoothly.
“I think the Tate in the first couple of years really had the wrong attitude and alienated quite a number of local residents with its attitude that, ‘we are the Tate, and therefore we can do what we want’,” Mitchell says. “I think after a couple of years, they realised that they maybe had the wrong people in position, and then there was a change of staff who really reached out to the community.”
A better visitor experience
Each year, Tate St Ives attracts more than 200,000 visitors, a figure that will certainly increase with the opening of the Palais. “We hope that in creating this holistic experience we will ease the pressure on the Barbara Hepworth Museum and Sculpture Garden, and just give it a bit more room to breathe,” says Anne Barlow, the director of Tate St Ives. “We’re not estimating [that] it’s going to double the numbers. There’s going to be a slight increase in numbers across the two sites, but the experience will be better.”
The Palais de Danse is expected to appeal to local visitors during the quieter winter months, and by positioning it as a community resource, the intention is that it will alleviate rather than exacerbate pressures on the local population. The revival of this much-loved local landmark, used as a warehouse for coal and tea before becoming a cinema and then a dance hall from 1925,may also bring in local people who have previously felt that Tate St Ives had nothing to offer them.
Two multi-day public consultation events in 2024 tapped a seam of local history, with people bringing along photographs and memorabilia, and memories. “There were so many stories about people’s parents, or grandparents, even, falling in love at a dance and getting married and then having kids”, Barlow says. “You’ve still got people alive today who remember going there for a dance out on Saturdays,” Mitchell says. “I think that’s just brilliant.”
Used by the dance teacher Phyllis Bedells when she came to St Ives during the Second World War, the Palais’s sprung maple dance floor proved ideal for Hepworth’s parties and as a display area. She retained Bedells’ large studio mirror, and created moveable glassine (a type of translucent paper) screens to make the space more flexible.
A space for community use
The floor will remain the beating heart of the Palais as, pending planning permission for designs proposed by Adam Khan Architects, it enters its next phase. Under the museum’s plans, the dance hall and adjoining small hall, which features a bar area that will be retained as “a distinct servery area and break-out space”, will be available for private and corporate hire, the fees for which will subsidise use by schools and community groups.
The aim is to provide a balance of experiences, with the venue’s layered history sensitively retained, and the Palais restored to the heart of town life. Community consultations have made clear that “people want the chaos of a workshop rather than the order of a gallery”, says Louise Connell, the head of programme management at Tate St Ives; therefore making is at the heart of the venture, with the yard given over to “messy making”.
However, Hepworth’s own story is just as important, and features from her time will be retained, with original items such as chairs reinstalled, less as exhibits than as furniture, as well as sculptures. A shortage of affordable housing in the town is a problem for both locals and visiting artists, and a flat will be available for residencies, increasingly in demand among a younger generation of artists keen to respond to Hepworth’s legacy at St Ives.
With two-thirds of the required funds now secure, the focus now is on ensuring a viable revenue plan for the anticipated opening of the Palais de Danse in two years’ time.