Editing Bridget Riley (section)

==Early life and education==
Riley was born on 24 April 1931<ref>{{cite web |url=https://artuk.org/discover/artists/riley-bridget-b-1931# |title=Bridget Riley |website=[[Art UK]] |access-date=22 April 2021}}</ref> in [[West Norwood|Norwood]], London.<ref name="Tate Biography" /> Her father, John Fisher Riley, originally from [[Yorkshire]], had been an Army officer. He was a printer by trade and owned his own business. In 1938, he relocated the printing business, together with his family, to [[Lincolnshire]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.op-art.co.uk/bridget-riley |title=Bridget Riley |author=Olly Payne |publisher=op-art.co.uk |year=2012 |access-date=1 March 2013}}</ref>

At the beginning of [[World War II]], her father, a member of the Territorial Army, was mobilised, and Riley, together with her mother and sister Sally, moved to a cottage in [[Cornwall]].<ref name="nytimes.com">Mary Blume (19 June 2008), [https://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/20/arts/20iht-BLUME.1.13802322.html Bridget Riley retrospective opens in Paris] ''[[The New York Times]]''.</ref> They shared the cottage with an aunt who had studied at [[Goldsmiths, University of London|Goldsmiths' College]], London and Riley attended talks given by a range of retired teachers and non-professionals.<ref name=Kudielka>{{cite book |last=Kudielka |first=Robert |chapter=Chronology |title=Bridget Riley: Paintings and Related Work |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dJksuQAACAAJ |location=London |publisher=National Gallery Company Limited |year=2010 |pages=67–72 |isbn=978-1-8570-9497-8}}.</ref> She attended [[Cheltenham Ladies' College]] (1946–1948) and then studied art at Goldsmiths' College (1949–52), and later at the [[Royal College of Art]] (1952–55).<ref name="Chilvers, Ian 2009. pp. 598-599">Chilvers, Ian & Glaves-Smith, John eds., ''Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Art'', Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. pp. 598–599</ref>

Between 1956 and 1959, she nursed her father, who had been involved in a serious car crash. She suffered a breakdown due to the deterioration of her father's health. After this she worked in a glassware shop. She eventually joined the [[J. Walter Thompson]] advertising agency, as an illustrator, where she worked part-time until 1962. The [[Whitechapel Gallery]] exhibition of [[Jackson Pollock]] in the winter of 1958 had an impact on her.<ref name=Kudielka/>

Her early work was figurative and semi-impressionist. Between 1958 and 1959, her work at the advertising agency showed her adoption of a style of painting based on the [[Pointillism|pointillist]] technique.<ref name="Bridget Riley">[http://www.moma.org/collection/artist.php?artist_id=4929 Bridget Riley] [[Museum of Modern Art]], New York.</ref> 

In 1959 Riley met the painter and art educator [[Maurice de Sausmarez]] at a residential summer school that he ran with [[Harry Thubron]] and Diane Thubron.<ref name=":2">{{Cite book |title=On Artists and Their Making: Selected Writings of Maurice de Sausmarez |date=2015 |publisher=Unicorn Press Publishing Group |isbn=978-1-910065-84-6 |location=London}}</ref> He became her friend and mentor, inspiring her to look closer at [[Futurism]] and [[Divisionism]] and artists such as [[Paul Klee|Klee]] and [[Georges Seurat|Seurat]].<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |title=Bridget Riley: on the occasion of the exhibition at Tate Britain, London 26 June - 28 September 2003 |date=2003 |publisher=Tate Publ |isbn=978-1-85437-492-9 |editor-last=Riley |editor-first=Bridget |location=London |editor-last2=Moorhouse |editor-first2=Paul |editor-last3=Tate Britain}}</ref> Riley and de Sausmarez began an intense romantic relationship later that year<ref>{{Cite news |last=Kimmelman |first=Michael |date=2000-09-28 |title=Not so square after all |url=https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2000/sep/28/artsfeatures2 |access-date=2024-04-09 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}</ref> and spent the summer of 1960 together painting in Italy where they visited the [[Venice Biennale]] which was hosting a large exhibition of [[Futurism|Futurist]] art.<ref name=":1" /> Riley painted ''Pink landscape'' (1960), a [[Pointillism|pointillist]] study of the landscape near [[Radicofani]] during this holiday.<ref>{{Cite book |last=De Sausmarez |first=Maurice |title=Bridget Riley |date=1970 |publisher=Studio Vista |isbn=978-0-289-79810-2 |location=London}}</ref> When the relationship ended in autumn of the same year, Riley suffered a personal and artistic crisis, creating paintings that would lead to black and white [[Op art|Op Art]] works, such as ''Kiss'' (1961).<ref name=":1" /> She began to develop her signature Op Art style consisting of black and white geometric patterns that explore the dynamism of sight and produce a disorienting effect on the eye and produces movement and colour.<ref name="Chilvers, Ian 2009. pp. 598-599" /> Riley and de Sausmarez maintained a professional friendship until his death in 1969.<ref name=":0" /> Riley has often cited his role as an early mentor<ref>{{Cite book |title=Maurice de Sausmarez 1915-1969 |publisher=The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery |year=2015 |isbn=9781874331551}}</ref> and de Sausmarez's monograph on Riley and her work was published after his death in 1970.<ref name=":0" />

Early in her career, Riley worked as an art teacher for children from 1957 to 1958 at the Convent of the Sacred Heart, [[Harrow, London|Harrow]] (now known as Sacred Heart Language College). At the Convent of the Sacred Heart, she began a basic design course. Later she worked at the [[Loughborough University|Loughborough School of Art]] (1959), [[Hornsey College of Art]], and [[Croydon College of Art]] (1962–64).<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/bridget-riley-1845|title=Bridget Riley, born 1931: Artist Biography|website=tate.org.uk|language=en-GB|access-date=5 February 2019}}</ref>

In 1961, she and her partner [[Peter Sedgley]] visited the [[Vaucluse]] plateau in the South of France, and acquired a derelict farm which they eventually transformed into a studio. Back in London, in the spring of 1962, [[Victor Musgrave]] of Gallery One held her first solo exhibition.<ref name=Kudielka/>

In 1968, Riley, with Sedgley and the journalist Peter Townsend, created the artists' organisation [[Space studios|SPACE]] (Space Provision Artistic Cultural and Educational), with the goal of providing artists large and affordable studio space.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.spacestudios.org.uk/space/the-space-story/1968-1978|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110510032728/http://www.spacestudios.org.uk/space/the-space-story/1968-1978|url-status=dead|title=The SPACE Story|archive-date=10 May 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2008/jul/05/art1|title=The life of Riley: Jonathan Jones interview with Bridget Riley, art world star of the 60s|first=Jonathan|last=Jones|newspaper=The Guardian |date=5 July 2008|via=www.theguardian.com}}</ref>