John Skeaping

John Rattenbury Skeaping, RA (9 June 1901 – 5 March 1980) was an English sculptor and equine painter and sculptor. He designed animal figures for Wedgwood, and his life-size statue of Secretariat is exhibited at the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame. Biography Born in South Woodford, Essex, Skeaping was the eldest son of the painter Kenneth Mathieson Skeaping and studied at Goldsmiths College in London, the Central School of Arts and Crafts between 1917 and 1919 and later at the Royal Academy until 1920. In 1924, he won the British Prix de Rome and its scholarship to the British School at Rome.̣ Skeaping was the first husband of the sculptor Barbara Hepworth, whom he met while studying in Rome. They married in May 1925 in Florence. The couple had a joint exhibition in 1928 at the Alex Reid and Lefevre Gallery in Glasgow. They had a son, Paul Skeaping, who was born in 1929 and died in 1953 in Thailand. Hepworth and Skeaping began divorce proceedings in 1931; the divorce was finalised in March 1933.