Bish-bash-bosh: how Phyllida Barlow conquered the art world at 73

After overlooking her for decades, the art world has woken up to Phyllida Barlow’s audacious, gargantuan sculptures. Now she is representing Britain at the Venice Biennale – but why did it take so long for her to be “discovered”?
The story of Phyllida Barlow’s precipitous rise to art-world fame is irresistible, and it has been told and retold so many times that it has taken on the quality of myth. It goes something like this. Once upon a time, in the middle of the l