A Conversation
Maker
(Artists)
1879-1961
1879-1961
Title
A Conversation
Date of Production
c. 1913-16
Medium
oil on canvas
Dimensions
Height: 86.6 cm (canvas)
Width: 81 cm (canvas)
Width: 81 cm (canvas)
Accession Number
P.1935.RF.24
Mode of Acquisition
Roger Fry Trustees, gift, 1935
Credit
The Courtauld, London (Samuel Courtauld Trust)
Copyright
© Estate of Vanessa Bell. All rights reserved, DACS 2023
Location
Not currently on display
Keywords
Label Text
Three women are shown in earnest conversation before a curtained window through which a flower garden is visible. The arrangement of the bodies and the close grouping of the heads give the gathering a sense of drama and a conspiratorial air. It was this humorous and incisive quality that the author Virginia Woolf admired most about the painting when she praised it in a letter to her sister: "I think you are a most remarkable painter. But I maintain you are into the bargain, a satirist, a conveyer of impressions about human life: a short story writer of great wit and able to bring off a situation in a way that rouses my envy." The painting retains its original frame, painted by Bell.
Provenance
Gift of the Roger Fry Trustees, 1935
Exhibition History
Vanessa Bell: A Pioneer of Modern Art, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 25/05/2024-06/10/2024
Vanessa Bell (1879-1961), Dulwich Picture Gallery, 08/02/2017-04/06/2017
Virginia Woolf: Art, Life and Vision, National Portrait Gallery, London, 10/07/2014-26/10/2014 ...More
Fabric of Vision, Dress and Drapery in Painting, National Gallery, London, 19/06/2002-08/09/2002
Fitzroy Street Retrospect : Soho painters 1910-1920, Artists' International Association, London, 01/07/1955-29/07/1955 ...Less
Vanessa Bell (1879-1961), Dulwich Picture Gallery, 08/02/2017-04/06/2017
Virginia Woolf: Art, Life and Vision, National Portrait Gallery, London, 10/07/2014-26/10/2014 ...More
Fabric of Vision, Dress and Drapery in Painting, National Gallery, London, 19/06/2002-08/09/2002
Fitzroy Street Retrospect : Soho painters 1910-1920, Artists' International Association, London, 01/07/1955-29/07/1955 ...Less
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