TALES FROM BELLA'S WORLD...

FRAGILE BEAUTY

FRAGILE BEAUTY

Here I am striking a pose in a room full of Nan Goldin prints at the Victoria and Albert museum. This room is part of an amazing selection of Sir Elton John and...

Bella's Birthday

Bella's Birthday

My birthday falls on April 17th. Most years it coincides with the Easter holidays when I or everyone else is away. As a child in the 60's and 70's we didnt have parties...

Dash the Dog

Dash the Dog

My son flew 5.351 miles back from California on his US college Spring Break to meet his father James's new puppy called Dash.  We had a family dog, a Border terrier named Joey...

Kim Gordon

Kim Gordon

I came late to Sonic Youth, after they split. I read Kim Gordon's memoir 'Girl in a Band' and was immediately interested in everything that interested her. I became fascinated by her look,...

Lucian Freud & His Rat

Lucian Freud & His Rat

When I was a child I kept a pet rat. It wasn't much bigger than a mouse and mostly lived on my shoulder. I would go for walks with it nestling under my...

YOKO ONO

YOKO ONO

When I was growing up in the 70’s, Yoko Ono seemed to be viewed by society – or at least by much of the media – as an enemy of the state. How...

Camila Batmanghelidjh

Camila Batmanghelidjh

  I had tears in my eyes when I read an interview with Camila Batmanghelidjh. It moved me the way she spoke about the young people she worked with through her charity Kids Company, her...

101 YEARS OF LUCIAN FREUD

101 YEARS OF LUCIAN FREUD

Last week I went to the archives of the National Portrait Gallery to look at some of the 47 sketch books our family donated after my father's  death in 2011. Sarah, Tanya and Carys,...

Shane MacGowan

Shane MacGowan

Few people have the ability to leave those they encounter with the feeling that they have been gifted a unique and treasurable exchange, never to be forgotten. Shane MacGowan had this power. Shane was no...

SIGH, CRY, ALMOST DIE

SIGH, CRY, ALMOST DIE

When I was a child in the late 1960’s my mother took us to live in Morocco for a couple of years. We didn’t have a lot of possessions but I was allowed...

Martin Amis

Martin Amis

I remember what I was wearing when I first met Martin Amis. My then husband, the writer James Fox, was a great friend of Amis’ and of his new wife the writer Isabel...

Bella Freud Autumn Winter

Bella Freud AW22

The Bella Freud Autumn-Winter 2022 (AW22) collection evokes an inquisitive and daring youthful spirit. Bella says: “It is important in fashion that you don't relax into being repetitive.”

GINSBERG IS GOD

GINSBERG IS GOD

I made a short film in 2002 with John Malkovich called 'Hideous Man', about some Beatnik girls waiting around in a club for their favourite poet to arrive and do a reading.