Vanessa Bell & Duncan Grant: Inside Bloomsbury

This autumn, Tate Britain will celebrate the extraordinary five-decade creative partnership between Vanessa Bell (1879-1961) and Duncan Grant (1885-1978), two of the most influential British artists of the 20th Century. Associated with the trailblazing Bloomsbury Group, Bell and Grant’s radical experimentation and unconventional approach to life reshaped art, literature and societal thought in Britain. Featuring over 300 works, Vanessa Bell & Duncan Grant: Inside Bloomsbury will be the first major exhibition to chart the duo’s relationship and artistic trajectory – from early post-impressionist and abstract paintings to late naturalistic self-portraits, landscapes, and still lifes. Demonstrating how they broke down the boundaries between art and everyday life, the show will bring together furniture, ceramics and textiles adorned with their modernist designs, as well as a once-in-a-lifetime restaging of the artists’ studio, relocated to Tate Britain from their East Sussex home, Charleston.

Although first introduced in 1906, it was a letter from Bell to Grant in 1909, inviting him to tea and proposing they address one another by their first names, that marked the beginning of an enduring, artistically fulfilling relationship. Portraits and self-portraits spanning Bell and Grant’s careers will chart both the course of their relationship and the evolution of their approach to artmaking. As core members of the Bloomsbury Group – a collective of artists, writers and intellectuals who discussed progressive ideas at 46 Gordon Square, the home of Bell and her siblings – both artists were at the forefront of avant-garde art in Britain. The exhibition will present works made before the pair met, to examine the formative experiences that shaped their radical art – from Bell’s instruction under John Singer Sargent which resulted in paintings like Iceland Poppies c.1908-9, to Grant’s encounter with historic masters in Paris, creating reproductions including After Chardin c.1906.

Viewing their works side-by-side, visitors will encounter their experiments with bold colour, simplified shapes and rhythmic lines, influenced by Roger Fry’s seminal exhibition ‘Manet and the Post-Impressionists’ in London in 1910. Their experimental works are exemplified by Bell’s Studland Beach c.1912 and Grant’s Group at Asheham 1913 , which depict their circle of friends. Paintings made alongside one another of the same subject highlight a shared visual language, including Bell’s Still Life on Corner of a Mantelpiece 1914 and Grant’s The Mantelpiece 1914. Changing the face of British art with their radical modernist style, they pushed post-impressionist techniques to the limit and produced some of the earliest abstract works in the country.

Central to the dissemination of modernist ideas in Britain were the Omega Workshops, a design enterprise with a communal ethos. Established in 1913, the workshops blurred the distinction between fine and decorative art. Joining as directors, Bell and Grant created designs collaboratively alongside others which were applied to works including ceramics, fans, lampstands, chairs, tables and wardrobes. Further demonstrating how they translated their unique visual language across a range of materials and scales, Tate Britain will highlight their array of commissions, including Bell’s book cover designs for her sister Virginia Woolf and Grant’s murals depicting scenes of leisure in summertime. Representing the rare instances in which they worked towards a shared artistic output, commissions they made together will also be represented, including the landmark feminist work Famous Women Dinner Service 1932-34 , comprising 50 hand-painted Wedgwood plates celebrating figures from Jane Austen to Cleopatra.

Though their partnership was predominantly creative, Bell and Grant shared a home for over 50 years and a daughter, Angelica. Favouring experimental ways of living, Bell had an open marriage with art critic and fellow Bloomsbury Group member, Clive Bell, while Grant had relationships predominantly with men. Although devoted to their domestic life together, insecurities arose from their nontraditional arrangement while Grant also experienced emotional conflict as a gay man in a society that did not accept him. The exhibition will showcase rarely seen erotic male nudes made by Grant, which remained hidden for many years, offering an insight into his life as a gay man.

Following the First World War, Bell and Grant returned to more naturalistic subjects, inspired in part by their travels across Europe. With a newfound sense of colour and form, they painted scenes along the Seine in Paris, and landscapes across the South of France, Italy and Spain. By the 1920s, they had settled into a stable, nontraditional family unit at Charleston in Sussex. The exhibition will present paintings conveying the serene life they experienced, marked by family, friends and art making, such as Bell’s Interior with the Artist’s Daughter c.1935-36 and Grant’s The Hammock 1921-23. For the very first time, the artists’ studio that they shared until 1939 will be relocated to Tate Britain while Charleston undergoes conservation work, offering a snapshot of the duo’s shared vision that continues to inspire generations, one in which art and everyday life are indivisible.

Notes to Editors

Vanessa Bell & Duncan Grant: Inside Bloomsbury is supported by Kim Jones. Further support from Farrow & Ball. With additional support from the Vanessa Bell & Duncan Grant Exhibition Supporters Circle, Tate Patrons and Tate Members. The exhibition is organised by Tate Britain in collaboration with Charleston. It is curated by Thomas Kennedy, Curator, Modern British Art, Tate Britain and Eliza Spindel, Assistant Curator, Modern British Art, Tate Britain.

Tate Members get unlimited free entry to all Tate exhibitions. Become a Member at tate.org.uk/members. Everyone aged 16-25 can visit all Tate exhibitions for £5 by joining Tate Collective. To join for free, visit tate.org.uk/tate-collective.

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Listings information
Vanessa Bell & Duncan Grant: Inside Bloomsbury
12 November 2026 – 11 April 2027 Tate Britain, Millbank, London SW1P 4RG Open daily 10.00–18.00 Tickets available at tate.org.uk and +44(0)20 7887 8888 Free for Members. Join at tate.org.uk/members
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About Vanessa Bell
Vanessa Bell was born in London in 1879 into an artistic and literary family. She studied drawing at Arthur Cope’s School of Art in Kensington, London before continuing to the Royal Academy Schools and the Slade School of Art. Following her parents’ death, she moved with her sister, Virginia Woolf, and her two brothers to 46 Gordon Square in Bloomsbury. There, they became central to a burgeoning milieu of artists, writers and critics set who rejected the constraints of their Victorian upbringings. In 1905, she founded the Friday Club, a society for exhibitions, lectures and discussions about art, where she exhibited her early paintings. In 1912, her work was included alongside Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse in the influential Second Post-Impressionist Exhibition at the Grafton Galleries in London. She had her first solo exhibition at The Omega Workshop in 1916 which was followed by another in 1922 at London’s Independent Gallery. During her lifetime, her work was exhibited internationally in exhibitions in Paris, Zurich, Pittsburgh and Venice.

About Duncan Grant
Duncan Grant was born in 1885 in Rothiemurchus, Scotland, spending his childhood in India where his army Major father was stationed. He returned to the UK in 1893 and enrolled at the Westminster School of Art in 1902. He attended Jacques-Emile Blanche’s Academie de la Palette in Paris in 1906, where he was inspired by artworks in the Louvre and artists such as Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Cézanne and Paul Gauguin, who he later exhibited alongside at the Second Post-Impressionist exhibition in 1912. At the outbreak of the First World War, Duncan became a conscientious objector, moving with Vanessa Bell, her children, and his lover David Garnett to Suffolk, and later to Charleston in East Sussex. He was a member of the Grafton Group, the New English Art Club and the Vorticists. His first solo exhibition was at the Carfax Gallery in 1920, and he represented Great Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1926 and 1932. A retrospective of his work was held at the Tate Gallery in 1964.

About Farrow & Ball
Paddy O’Donnell, Global Brand Ambassador, Farrow & Ball, said: “It’s thrilling to be part of Tate Britain’s forthcoming show celebrating the extraordinary talents of Vanessa Bell & Duncan Grant whose aesthetic and artistic triumph still resonates today and a huge privilege for Farrow & Ball to play a part in bringing their colour sensibilities to life.”

Farrow & Ball has been based in Dorset, England, since 1946, and remains dedicated to handcrafting richly pigmented paints and unique wallpapers using only the finest ingredients. The result is a directional palette with extraordinary response to light and artisanal wallpapers printed with real paint. With decades of craft and collaborations with leading institutions, Farrow & Ball is proud to be working with Tate across the UK, a reflection of the brand’s blend of heritage and innovation.

Related Publications
Vanessa Bell & Duncan Grant: Inside Bloomsbury
Edited by Thomas Kennedy Hardback £45; Paperback, £32 Published to accompany Tate Britain’s exhibition, this richly illustrated publication delves into the extraordinary creative relationship between Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant, two of the most celebrated British artists of the 20th century. Featuring contributions from contemporary artists, designers, writers, art historians, painting conservators and an interview between Curator Thomas Kennedy and President of the Charleston Trust and Bell’s granddaughter, Virginia Nicholson.