In Vanessa Bell’s The School Room, all is pattern: from the looping wallpaper to the tablecloth, the striped drapes and lampshade, the softly mottled armchair and the chequered effect of the net curtain, decoration and design abounds. Even the vase of scarlet flowers and their plump, feather-like leaves suggests a fleur de lis or a Tudor rose; a still life made motif. The school room depicted here is perhaps of a type not widely recognized, but it portrays the kind of place that Bell, who was home educated, and who started a small home school for her own children, would have known.

This print was initially commissioned by Robert Wellington and John Piper as the 13th in their second series of 25 'Lyons' Lithographs, printed in seven colours on cream wove in 1938 and published by Contemporary Lithographs Ltd., London.

https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1037131/print-vanessa-bell/