Bridget Riley: A Very Very Person

In January 1965 the international art world converged on New York and paid homage to abrilliant new star. The glittering opening of The Responsive Eye, a major exhibition of abstract painting at the Museum of Modern Art, signalled the latest phenomenon, Op Art – and its centre of attention was a young woman. Bridget Riley’s dazzling painting Current appeared on the cover of the catalogue; her first solo show in New York sold out; and when featured in Vogue magazine the Riley ‘look’ became a fashion craze. Overnight, she had become a sensation – in every sense. Yet only three years earlier, Riley was a virtual unknown. How did success arrive so suddenly?

 

A Very Very Person is the first biography of Bridget Riley and addresses that tantalising question. Focusing on her early years, it tells the story of a remarkable woman whose art and life were entwined in surprising ways. This intimate narrative explores Riley’s wartime childhood spent in the idyllic Cornish countryside, her subsequent struggles to find her way as an artist, and the personal crises and challenges she faced before finally arriving as one of the world’s most celebrated artists.