In March/April 1928 Virginia and Leonard Woolf in a recently acquired Singer Saloon car (model 10/26) drove through France to Cassis, near Marseille, where Virginia's sister, Vanessa Bell and her partner Duncan Grant had a house, reproducing the life style of their Sussex home, 'Charleston,' in the south of France.The pocket diaries of Leonard Woolf, held in the East Sussex Records Office (The Keep) near Sussex University, reveal their exact route, places visited on the way there and back, the daily mileage, lunch stops, hotels stayed at etc.
I replicated this journey with my wife, Jill, in the Spring of 2018. We followed their exact route, staying were possible at the same hotels, passing through and visiting the same places, stopping off for lunch where they did etc. We posted each day, on an Instagram account (followingthewoolfs) photographs and commentary about our trip. From this material we will be publishing a book with Unicorn Press about the journey reflecting on cultural and political differences between 1928 and 2018, publication is scheduled for the latter half of 2020.
I am also working on a box set of prints collages and texts about figures associated with the Bloomsbury circle titles The Surfaces of Pleasure and Politics. Below are some initial preparatory portrait prints of key Bloomsbury figures associated with France and Cassis which may give some impression of the likely approach to be taken. . These are in descending order, Virginia Woolf, Leonard Woolf, Vanessa Bell, Meynard Keynes, Lydia Lopokova, Clive Bell, Quentin Bell, Lytton Strachey, Roger Fry and Nina Hamnett.
I replicated this journey with my wife, Jill, in the Spring of 2018. We followed their exact route, staying were possible at the same hotels, passing through and visiting the same places, stopping off for lunch where they did etc. We posted each day, on an Instagram account (followingthewoolfs) photographs and commentary about our trip. From this material we will be publishing a book with Unicorn Press about the journey reflecting on cultural and political differences between 1928 and 2018, publication is scheduled for the latter half of 2020.
I am also working on a box set of prints collages and texts about figures associated with the Bloomsbury circle titles The Surfaces of Pleasure and Politics. Below are some initial preparatory portrait prints of key Bloomsbury figures associated with France and Cassis which may give some impression of the likely approach to be taken. . These are in descending order, Virginia Woolf, Leonard Woolf, Vanessa Bell, Meynard Keynes, Lydia Lopokova, Clive Bell, Quentin Bell, Lytton Strachey, Roger Fry and Nina Hamnett.