She was born Vanessa Stephen, a daughter of Sir Leslie Stephen and the elder sister of Virginia, who later became better known as the novelist, Virginia Woolf. After the deaths of their parents, the sisters lived in the Bloomsbury district of London, where they came into contact with those who would become their set. Vanessa studied art under Sir Arthur Cope and, after his death, at the Royal Academy Schools. In 1907 she married Clive Bell. They had two sons, but were unhappy, and in 1916 she left him to live with another painter, Duncan Grant. Like Grant, Vanessa contributed to the Omega Workshops established by Roger Fry. After the First World War, she became a member of the London Group.