is a watershed in 20th-century British Modern Art history, representing the first of its kind in an auction house.
The colourful, avant-garde spirit of Britain’s bohemian intelligentsia of the 20th century brings together works by Vanessa Bell, Duncan Grant, Roger Fry, Virginia Woolf, and Henry Lamb and provides a rare opportunity to see paintings, sketches, furniture, ceramics, and literary artefacts that reflect the Group’s iconic impact on British culture.
Originating in London’s Bloomsbury but finding its soul at Charleston—the Sussex farmhouse turned an artistic haven for Bell and Grant—the Group challenged convention in art and life. Today, Charleston, which is gearing up for its nearly 50th anniversary as a charitable trust, is home to one of the most extensive collections of Bloomsbury works worldwide. The house has generously lent many treasures to the exhibition, including some just acquired through its 50 for 50 campaign, a bold endeavour to reclaim key works still in private hands.
The Group extends to fashion, where its influence continues to fire up innovation. Designer Kim Jones, long inspired by the Bloomsbury ethos, has brought elements from Bell, Grant, and Woolf into his collections in Dior and Fendi. Now Vice President of Charleston, Jones is lending his curatorial insight and selections from his extensive Bloomsbury collection to Radical Modernity for an added layer of richness to this celebration.
The lives of Bell and Grant at Charleston had been an unconventional dance of romance and creative synergy, each a muse to the other. The romantic relationship may have cooled, but deep friendship and artistic partnership remained, and Charleston became a playground for creativity. Alongside many of his introspective self-portraits is a 1909 piece that deliciously melds colourful influences of his early life in India with his Scottish roots.
To get a glimpse of Charleston’s pulse, Grant’s ironic log box – an utterly banal object transmogrified by his exuberant imagination. It is painted with the figures of angels, and its overtones of Renaissance and Ballets Russes bring right to the Sussex hearth of Charleston, in fact, the Bloomsbury ideal of linking art and everyday life.
Another important Bloomsbury trait: idolisation of forceful, eccentric women. Known variously as a tireless proponent of the women’s suffrage movement and the intellectual inspiration behind her many children’s and grandchildren’s educations, Lady Strachey instigated her nephew’s career when she persuaded his parents to let him train as an artist. Bell’s iconic 1923 portrait of Strachey, seldom seen outside Charleston since Bell’s retrospective at Dulwich Picture Gallery in 2017, captures the irrepressible defiance that propelled the leading figures of Bloomsbury.
Another is Bell’s The Hotel Garden, Florence, an early 1909 piece that captures one heady summer in Italy with her husband, Clive. On public view for the first time, this sun-drenched scene acts as a cue to Bell’s singular ability to capture fleeting beauty in colour and light.
One of the most coveted pieces in the exhibition is Bell’s rare narrative work, The Party, which was originally gifted to her sister, Virginia Woolf. Also titled Mrs Dalloway’s Party, it summons the über-indulgent spirit of Bloomsbury’s soirées and winks at Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway. It disappeared into Woolf’s private collection until its rediscovery many decades later, joining together two brilliant sisters through art and literature.
Roger Fry’s Omega Workshops took its brief from the sublime elevation of the humble, producing items for everyday use that bridged the gap between high art and functional design. Anonymous ceramics stamped only with the Omega symbol give evidence of this avant-garde, boundary-blurring ethos; the sale of these highly collectable pieces underwrote artists like Bell and Grant.
Another rare feature is a rare silk robe designed by Vorticist founder Percy Wyndham Lewis at Omega, which underlines the group’s revolutionary take on fashion. The robe was hand-embroidered and block-printed, part of Lewis’s brief flirtation with Bloomsbury before setting up the Rebel Art Centre in 1914—an era when fashion, art, and politics exploded.
Radical Modernity is an ode to Bloomsbury’s provocative and enduring legacy, replete with moments of intimacy and ingenuity that define a generation.
Top Photo Detail Duncan Portrait of Vanessa Bell courtesy Sotheby’s