Vanessa Bell’s book jackets for her sister Virginia Woolf and Duncan Grant’s murals are part of a Tate Britain exhibition that asks what happened when two painters took their work beyond the canvas. Vanessa Bell & Duncan Grant: Inside Bloomsbury runs at the Millbank gallery from 12 November 2026 to 11 April 2027.
The exhibition follows a creative partnership that lasted about five decades. Both artists were central to the Bloomsbury Group, the circle of writers, artists and thinkers whose name comes from the London neighbourhood where many of them lived or met. Tate Britain has organised the exhibition with Charleston, the Sussex home and workplace that Bell and Grant shared.
From paintings to book covers and murals
The scale of the work changes throughout the exhibition. Bell’s designs for Woolf’s books show what she could do with the space of a cover, while Grant’s murals use a much larger surface to depict people at leisure. Seeing those commissions alongside painting makes it easier to follow the choices the artists carried from one medium to another.
At a glance
Where Tate Britain, Millbank, London
When 12 November 2026 to 11 April 2027
Booking Check Tate’s exhibition listings for admission and current availability.
Featured photograph of the venue by Rept0n1x, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Resized.
