THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 26, 1996 TAG: 9610260625
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B5 EDITION: FINAL
DATELINE: SOUTHERN SHORES LENGTH: 54 lines
Mrs. Henrietta Hoopes Heath of Southern Shores, died on Oct. 22, 1996, in Albemarle Hospital, Elizabeth City.
She was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Hoopes and was reared in Wilmington, Del. She was a graduate of Holton Arms, studied at the Corcoran School of Art in Washington, D.C., and later at the Sorbonne under Paris masters Andre l'Hote and Louis Marcousis. Her pet subjects included eggs, feathers and shells, bullfighting scenes, hunting scenes (many of which were printed in Town and Country) and she was renowned for her portraits.
She held exhibitions throughout the United States and Europe. Prominent among these were an exhibition at New York City's Knoedler Galleries, a one-woman show at the Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences (now the Chrysler Museum) and an exhibition in Pamplona, Spain, arranged by the famous bullfighter Barrera, and attended by Ernest Hemingway, who wrote a spontaneous ``review'' of the works in her show program.
She painted many prominent figures and their family members, including producer Nunnally Johnson's daughter, Mrs. Henry Stetson; the children of director Henry Potter, and Mrs. Ogden Nash. She is listed in ``Who's Who Among American Artists,'' and always placed significantly in competitions alongside other famous painters, including Andrew Wyeth.
In 1924, Mrs. Heath married novelist Charles Wertenbaker, the first journalist (Time Magazine) to enter Paris after The Liberation. She loved Paris and spent quite a bit of time there during the 1930s. In 1934, she moved to California where she lived and worked in a studio overlooking the Pacific. In 1941 she married Norfolk lawyer James Elliott Heath Jr. They lived in Germany for three years, during which time Mr. Heath was a member of the American staff for the Nuremberg war crimes trials. Mrs. Heath would accompany her husband to the trials, and sketched the likes of Goering and Hess during the proceedings.
In 1949 the Heaths moved to Virginia Beach, then to Southern Shores in 1967. Mrs. Heath continued to hold exhibitions, and painted until the mid-1980s.
She is survived by her only child, Ms. Henrietta Elliott Heath of Grenada, Spain. Mrs. Heath was greatly loved, and will long be remembered for her wit and style, her fierce loyalty, her tremendous courage, her inspiring independence and joie de vivre. She once said of her adventurous life that it was lived the same way she painted: absolutely, and without regret. ``Regret,'' she said, ``is death to an image.''
She requested that donations be made to: The Department of Social Services for Dare County - (please designate in-home services), P.O. Box 669, Manteo, N.C. 27954, in order that others continue to benefit from the kind of support for which she was most grateful. Friends and family of Mrs. Heath also suggest that making blood donations at your local Red Cross chapter would be an appropriate and loving tribute.
Friends and family will be contacted for a memorial service. ILLUSTRATION: Photo
KEYWORDS: DEATH OBITUARY by CNB