In the heart of Milton Keynes, an artistic revolution is about to take center stage. MK Gallery’s upcoming exhibition, Vanessa Bell: A World of Form and Colour, offers the most comprehensive exploration of the modernist painter’s legacy ever mounted. Running from October 19, 2024, to February 23, 2025, this exhibition not only reclaims Bell’s rightful place in the history of British art but also shines a light on her pioneering contributions to feminist artistic practice. It’s a long-awaited tribute to a woman who shaped a creative movement and built an artistic world where women could truly thrive.
A Modernist Trailblazer
As a founding member of the Bloomsbury Group, a collective of early 20th-century intellectuals that included her sister, Virginia Woolf, Bell was far more than just a painter of beautiful landscapes and intimate interiors. She stood at the forefront of British abstraction, embracing modernity with daring, uncompromising vision. Bell’s work was radical not only in its form—sharp lines, bold colours, and geometric simplicity—but in its collaborative spirit.
She was instrumental in creating spaces where artists, particularly women, could break free from the rigid norms of Victorian society. Bell co-founded the Omega Workshops in 1913, a collective dedicated to experimental design, which blurred the lines between fine art and applied art, dismantling the cultural hierarchies that valued painting above pottery or furniture.
Forgotten Feminist Masterpiece
At the heart of the exhibition lies one of Bell’s most intriguing and overlooked creations: the Famous Women Dinner Service. Created in 1932 with her close collaborator, Duncan Grant, this collection of 50 hand-painted plates celebrates women from history and myth, from Queen Victoria to Cleopatra, Elizabeth I to Greta Garbo. The plates, each a portrait of a different heroine, were designed for a fantastical dinner party that never took place—at least not in real life. But the sentiment behind them—of elevating women’s stories, of honoring their contributions—was a radical feminist act in itself.
The dinner service was commissioned by a young Kenneth Clark, later famous as a TV historian, and after languishing in obscurity for nearly 80 years, it now takes center stage in this exhibition. Anthony Spira, MK Gallery’s director, calls it “one of the great works of feminist applied art,” a fitting centerpiece for a show that reclaims Bell’s groundbreaking approach to creativity.
Creativity as Everyday Life
What makes Bell’s vision so extraordinary is the way she infused art into everyday life. For Bell, creativity wasn’t something confined to a canvas or a rarefied gallery space—it was a way of living. The Famous Women Dinner Service may be a fine art object today, but Bell intended it for the dinner table, to be used in everyday moments. “To Bell, creativity isn’t a rarefied, intimidating action,” Spira notes, “it’s a part of everyday life.”
This democratic approach to art-making is evident throughout the exhibition, where paintings sit alongside ceramics, textiles, and furniture—all part of Bell’s holistic vision of a world where art and life are one. Her collaborative spirit extended to her relationship with Duncan Grant, her lifelong companion, and fellow Bloomsbury member. Together, they transformed their farmhouse in Sussex, Charleston, into an artistic retreat—a place where experimentation in every form of art was not only allowed but encouraged.
Feminist Roots, Modern Recognition
Bell’s work, once overlooked by a cultural establishment that favored male artists and dismissed applied arts as “lesser” than painting, is now receiving the recognition it deserves. The exhibition’s feminist roots resonate deeply in today’s art world, where the appetite for rediscovering overlooked female artists has never been stronger.
The Famous Women Dinner Service has already drawn comparisons to Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party, the 1979 feminist masterpiece that honored women from history with a similar celebration of their lives and achievements. Chicago, who was unaware of Bell’s plates when she created her own work, now acknowledges the importance of this earlier feminist statement. In her essay for the exhibition catalogue, Chicago calls the Famous Women Dinner Service “a unique and unknown body of art,” praising it for illuminating a “little-known aspect of women’s history: the desire to honor women.”
