Anne Olivier Bell

Her husband Quentin died in 1996. Anne Olivier Bell died on 18 July 2018.

Anne's 2013 portrait by Eva Vermandel resides in the permanent collection of London's National Portrait Gallery.

While the British government did not initially acknowledge the efforts of the Monument Men, the US established a foundation to recognise them, and Anne was lauded in 2007 for her contributions. She received an MBE in the New Year's Honours list of 2014 for services to Literature and the Arts.

Anne Olivier Bell received honorary doctorates from the University of Sussex and University of York. In 1984, she was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Charleston became open to the public in the 1980s, presented in the period style of the Bloomsbury group. Till her death, she was the president of the trust. She was also an expert on the artworks preserved there, and an editor of Canvas, the publication of the Friends of Charleston.

The Charleston Farmhouse was the country seat of the Bloomsbury group. After the death of Duncan Grant in 1978, Anne was instrumental in establishing a charitable trust to preserve the property. The artistic influence of the Bloomsbury group was fading by then, and the farmhouse itself was in a poor state of repair. It took six years of fundraising to monetise the trust.

Anne assisted her husband, Quentin Bell, in his monumental biography of Virginia Woolf by compiling index cards for each month of her life, and copying Leonard Woolf's diaries. The biography was published to acclaim in 1972. Anne then edited the diaries of Virginia Woolf, publishing them in five volumes starting in 1977.

After the Second World War, Anne met Quentin Bell, who asked her to model for him. They married in 1952. In 1967, they moved to Cobbe Place in Beddingham, when Bell was made Professor of Art History and Theory at the University of Sussex. The couple had three children, two daughters and a son.

Anne joined the Arts Council in 1947. She was responsible for the publication of exhibition catalogues. She also escorted paintings from the Alte Pinakothek in Munich for an exhibition at the National Gallery, London.

In 1945, Anne became one of the Monuments Men, seeking to prevent the destruction of cultural artefacts in Germany, and to restore artworks stolen by the Nazis. She travelled to Bünde, the only female member of the programme and the only civilian, albeit with a rank of major. While the men sought out hidden art, she was responsible for organisation and documentation.

In 1937 she was in Paris for the World's Fair, where she met and had a relationship with Graham Bell. He painted a portrait of her, which is now at the Tate Museum.

Anne's mother died in 1935, after which she lived with her father. She attended St Paul's Girls' School, then went to Germany to train as an opera singer. Unsuccessful in this, she returned to London to join the Central School of Speech and Drama. Her audition for the Royal Albert Hall failed, and she enrolled at the Courtauld Institute.

Anne had two brothers. Her parents divorced in 1924. After her mother's remarriage to F. R. G. N. Sherrard, she moved with them to Dorset. Her mother had three more children with Sherrard.

Anne Olivier Bell MBE (née Popham; 22 June 1916 – 18 July 2018) was an English art scholar. She was part of the Bloomsbury Group and best known for editing the diaries of Virginia Woolf. As a member of the Monuments Men, she was responsible for the protection of cultural artefacts in Europe during the Second World War and earned the military rank of Major.