The definitive and authorised biography of the artist Vanessa Bell.

Even through the lens of the twenty-first century, the story of Vanessa Bell's life is unorthodox. A powerful magnetic figure, Bell lived at the heart of the Bloomsbury Group and was often the core figure around which the disparate individuals of the movement revolved.

Her art and designs - so often overshadowed by her sister Virginia Woolf's writings and fame and by the interest in her own unconventional life - made a significant contribution to the history of the Bloomsbury Group. Yet, until this authorised biography was written, she has remained a largely silent and enigmatic figure.

In this captivating account, acclaimed art historian and biographer Frances Spalding restores Bell to the heart of the Bloomsbury Group, illuminating an exceptional life and the free-spirited circle among which she lived.

Frances Spalding is an art historian, critic and biographer, and a leading authority of Bloomsbury. She wrote an introduction to the subject, The Bloomsbury Group, for the National Portrait Gallery's 'Companion' series, and has written biographies of Roger Fry, Duncan Grant, Gwen Raverat and of the poet Stevie Smith, as well as Vanessa Bell.

For ten years she edited the Charleston Magazine. Her recent books include John Piper, Myfanwy Piper: Lives in Art and Prunella Clough: Regions Unmapped. She is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Art, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and Professor of Art History at Newcastle University, and was awarded a CBE in 2005.