ImagesBrighton pictures of the week 12-4-2004

IMAGESBRIGHTON photography by david gray
	B L O O M S B U R Y S C U L P T U R E I N S U S S E X
	P I C T U R E S O F T H E W E E K 1 2 - 4 - 2 0 0 4

The Bloomsbury Group of writers and artists were an important part of English cultural life in the first half of the last century. They were also a pretty rum bunch of characters. Though mainly based in London, they had second homes in Sussex and their creativity seemed to flourish most exotically in what was then a quiet corner of rural England. In particular, they created gardens filled with striking sculptures and decorative features. Their houses have an unusual atmosphere of pleasure and playfulness along with an undercurrent of unhappiness. Virginia Woolf, the novelist at the centre of the Bloomsbury Group, killed herself at Rodmell, in view of the pretty church and the rolling hills of the South Downs. The pictures in this week's set on the sculptures in these Sussex gardens were all taken in April 2004.

The striking and sad bust of Virginia Woolf in the garden at Rodmell (image 2502-51)

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