Mad Bloomsbury

Mad Bloomsbury is a landmark exhibition exploring how the Bloomsbury group engaged with evolving ideas of madness in twentieth-century Britain.Drawing on new research the exhibition re-examines forgotten and familiar Bloomsbury histories through the lenses of disability, neurodiversity and lived experience, and explores their intersections with queer, feminist and class histories.The exhibition coincides with the centenary of Virginia Woolf’s essay ‘On Being Ill’ (1926) and includes a rare public display of works by Helen Coombe, the artist and long-term institutionalised wife of Roger Fry.

This exhibition reflects a wider shift in how Charleston tells its own history and acts as a sector-leading approach to telling these histories.It is co-produced with the Mad Heritage Collective and is curated by Hazel McMichael, Charleston’s Curating Visibility Fellow.