Bell, Quentin

Quentin Bell was an author, artist, critic and biographer of his aunt, Virginia Woolf. He was born in London in 1910, to Clive and Vanessa Bell, who was Woolf’s sister; his parents separated when he was six. He studied art in Paris before mounting his first exhibition, and in 1947 published his first book, On Human Finery. Bell went on to publish more non-fiction books, as well as a novel. During his career he was a lecturer in art education at King’s College, Newcastle, and a professor of fine art at Oxford and the University of Leeds; he was also chair of history and theory of art at the University of Sussex. He received much acclaim when his biography of Virginia Woolf was published in 1972; and in 1996, the year of his death, his memoir Bloomsbury Recalled was hailed as a significant contribution to the history of that creative group. Bell was survived by his wife Anne Olivier Bell, and three children.