This lecture provides a short introduction to art and life of Katsushika Hokusa, looking at his diverse career and artistic impact.

In the first part, we will introduce his fascinating life as an artist, from storyteller to teacher, from performance painter to the landscape artist we know him to be - coming to his Great Wave and its historical context. Then, we look at Hokusai’s unprecedented influence on Western art by examining some of the artists inspired by him. These include Claude Monet, Edgar Degas and Vincent van Gogh. The hope is to give a full picture of Hokusai, his Great Wave and beyond.

In the early AD 280s, Roman Gaul was threatened by internal revolt (from renegades called the Bacaudae) and German pirates. A Roman general called Carausius excelled in crushing the Bacaudae so the emperors Diocletian and Maximian appointed him as commander of the northern fleet.

Carausius was from Menapia (around the Rhine delta) and had maritime experience. He was very successful against the pirates but was accused of treacherous practices by Maximian. As a result, Carausius rebelled, declared himself an emperor and took control of Britannia for around seven years (AD 286-93). He had a powerful army and fleet, built shore forts against attack from the sea and even struck his own coinage (which sometimes cited Virgil!). When he was killed, his successor, Allectus, ruled Britain for another two to three years before the Roman emperor Constantius retook the island for Rome in AD 295 or 296. This lecture will tell this remarkable story, bizarrely bypassed in the British school curriculum, through archaeological sites, sculpture, mosaics and numismatic art.

Elisabeth Vigée-Le Brun was an eighteenth century artist, painting the aristocracy of France during the Revolution and in the shadow of the Guillotine.

She created portraits for the nobility of Europe and even travelled to England. She also painted over twenty-five self-portraits throughout her life, and wrote her memoirs. I will focus on three aspects of Elisabeth’s life – Mother, Heroine and Artist – illustrating her story with her art and her own words. The search for Elisabeth will take us to France, Italy and England during the exhilarating and dangerous time of the French Revolution.

Dr Alison Barker taught History and Art History at further and higher education for over twenty years and currently works at the University of Essex. She speaks widely to diverse groups on many historical and art historical topics, and has led guided tours at the British Museum and the National Gallery.  Alison wrote her PhD thesis on the depiction of Saint George in art and has published work on his image in both England and Italy.  She has presented Papers for the Renaissance Society of America in both Boston and Dublin.  Her book, The Dissemination of Saint George in Early Modern Art has been recently published by Routledge.

From the 1880s Stanhope Forbes, Walter Langley, Frank Bramley and others working in Cornwall began to be recognised as a discrete school.

Examining the process of that recognition, there will be a description of how the work of the Newlyn-based artists responded to international movements and ultimately how they came into conflict with trends elsewhere in British art. 

Alan Read has a masters and first-class honours degree in History of Art from Birkbeck College, University of London. He is a gallery guide at Tate Britain and regularly lectures at both London Tates. For twenty years he was a gallery guide and lecturer at the National Portrait Gallery and the Dulwich Picture Gallery. He also works as a London Blue Badge Guide.

 In 1848 seven young men – mostly artists – formed a secret brotherhood, bent on reforming British art. They were determined to paint with that attention to nature and vivid colour which (they believed) had prevailed in the Middle Ages, before Raphael and the Renaissance initiated a fatal decline. Once the secret of the brotherhood was exposed, their work aroused fierce criticism. They were championed however by John Ruskin, a 30-year-old critic whose observations of art and nature had already made him an influential figure. Ruskin’s association with the Pre-Raphaelites left his personal life in disorder, but brought the crusading artists the recognition which they still enjoy today. 

Patrick was from1970-71 Teacher at Marlborough College. 1975-86 Keeper of Fine Art at the Royal Pavilion, Art Gallery & Museums, Brighton. Since 1986 Director of the Martyn Gregory Gallery, London. Author of several books including Savage Ruskin, Oriental Architecture in the West and George Chinnery, artist of India and the China Coast.

According to one leading architect, “the modern architectural drawing is interesting, the photograph is magnificent, the building is an unfortunate but necessary stage between the two.”  Architecture + Photography = Art introduces photographers who crystallised the architects’ vision in images that are both works of art in their own right and shape our opinion of the buildings they depict. These photographers include Dell and  Wainwright from Britain, Julius Shulman in the United States and Lucien Hervé in France. The lecture also examines photographers who recorded rural churches, barns and cottages to create a lyrical vision of Britain. Prominent in this group are Edwin Smith, Frederick Evans and Eric de Maré, a friend and drinking companion of John Betjeman and widely considered to have been the poet’s favourite photographer. 

Brian Stater lectured at University College London for 25 years, retiring in 2021 as a Senior Teaching Fellow. His principal academic interest lay in the appreciation of architecture and he has a lifelong enthusiasm for photography. He therefore offers lectures to The Arts Society on each of these subjects. He has written on architecture for a wide range of publications and an exhibition of his own photographs was held at UCL. Brian is a former member of the Association of Historical and Fine Art Photography. He works with a range of cameras, including a pre-War Leica as used by his great hero, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and many others. Brian is an engaging and amusing speaker who seeks to entertain as well as inform his audience. 

The 1700s was a period when the people of England seemed to be especially gullible. They believed a woman could give birth to rabbits; a man could climb inside a two pint bottle and sing inside it; and where a blond-haired European could write a book claiming that he was born in Taiwan. These hoaxes weren't just written about extensively in newspapers and journals but also brilliantly and amusingly depicted by satirical artists such as William Hogarth and James Gillray. In this entertaining talk Ian demonstrates how 18th century hoaxes are memorable not only for their imaginative nature but also because of the differing motives of the trick.

Ian Keable gained a First Class degree from Oxford University, qualified as a Chartered Accountant and then became a Professional Magician. In 2014 he published Charles Dickens Magician: Conjuring in Life, Letters & Literature. His latest book is The Century of Deception: The Birth of the Hoax in Eighteenth-Century England.

He now divides his time between performing magic, giving talks and researching and writing. He is a Member of The Inner Magic Circle and in 2024 was appointed the Archivist of The Magic Circle. He is presently writing a biography of David Devant, the first President of The Magic Circle and considered to be England's greatest ever magician.

Michael Praetorius’s music was celebrated again in his anniversary year of 2021, and thanks to a wonderful 1994 disc from the Gabrieli Consort, his music for Christmas has become his most loved calling card. Paul McCreesh describes it as “Lutheran music at its most beguiling” as well as “community music at its best’, allowing amateur singers, congregational input, children’s choirs and local instrumentalists to join in. Through his settings of the great carols Von Himmel hoch, In dulci jubilo, Puer natus in Bethlehem, Quem pastores laudavere and Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern, we will be able to travel through the entire Advent, Christmas and Epiphany stories, whilst exploring contemporary art and history. 

Patrick Craig is a Vicar Choral at St Paul’s Cathedral. For twenty years he combined this with an international career singing over a thousand concerts with the world-renowned early music consort The Tallis Scholars. He also sings with the award-winning group The Cardinall’s Musick. He founded and conducts this country’s leading all-female professional choir, Aurora Nova. He has conducted concerts for the BBC Proms, the Brighton, Lichfield and Aldeburgh Festivals, and with the City of London Sinfonia. As a Cambridge history graduate with a lifelong interest in the arts, he has gone on to lead choral workshops for amateur singers across the world, where he places music in its historical and cultural context. He regularly lectures for the St Paul’s Adult Education programme and for John Hall’s Venice Courses, which have allowed him to incorporate his interests in theology, art and poetry.  In 2020, when his singing and conducting work disappeared overnight as a result of the Covid pandemic, Patrick poured all his experience into online presentations which have raised vital funds for the Help Musicians Charity. 

What a life! In 40 years, Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin was responsible for dozens of churches, cathedrals, monastic buildings, almshouses and private residences. His work ranges from the lovely church of St Giles Cheadle and the Medieval Court at the Great Exhibition of 1851 to the ornate decoration of the Houses of Parliament (and Alton Towers!). A writer, keen sailor, drug addict, original 'angry young man', designer and polemicist, Pugin also had 3 wives, several girlfriends, at least 8 children - and died insane at just 40! We explore this volcanic personality, discussing in particular the 'Gothic Revival' which Pugin pioneered and which swept through Victorian Britain and much of the world. 

Andrew Davies: Extra-Mural Tutor for London, Essex and The Open University; Author of 9 books, including The East End Nobody Knows; frequent contributor to radio and television; has lectured all over the world; organises walks to complement his lectures. 

Francis Bacon is one of the most celebrated artists of the twentieth century. Perhaps more than any other artist he captured the darkness at the heart of human experience. His work reflects the anxiety of a world reeling from the impact of the Second World War, the holocaust and the atomic threat of the cold war. In this talk we’ll examine Bacon’s work in the context of his personal, artistic and intellectual experiences and utilise concepts from existentialist philosophy and psychoanalysis to unpack the meaning of his work, which explores abjection and treads a tightrope between nihilism and hope. 

Colin Pink has a BA in Philosophy and Politics from the University of Southampton and a MA in the History of Art from Birkbeck, University of London. He specialises in twentieth century and contemporary art in Europe and North America. He lectures at Morley College London. He has also curated exhibitions of contemporary art and has published four books of poetry: Acrobats of Sound, 2016, The Ventriloquist Dummy’s Lament, 2019, Typicity, 2021 and Wreck of the Jeanne Gougy, 2021. 

Immerse yourself in a world of carnations, tulips, hyacinths and roses as you discover the history of the famous Turkish Iznik ceramics. From its origins imitating Chinese porcelain to its 16th-century heyday and subsequent decline. The focus on flowers makes this an ideal subject for spring but it works equally well at any time of year. 

Dr Antonia Gatward Cevizli is an independent art historian specialising in both Italian Renaissance art and Ottoman art. She gained her PhD from the University of Warwick. Her publications focus on cultural and diplomatic exchange between the Italian city-states and the Ottomans. Antonia has lectured for a number of institutions including Sabancı University, Istanbul; Sotheby’s Institute of Art; the National Gallery; the V&A Academy and The Courtauld summer school. Her interests are wide-ranging and she also worked across the collections of both Tate Modern and Tate Britain as a professional guide. She has lived in Siena, Venice and Istanbul. 

This lecture will consider the artistic output of one of the leading textile designers of the 20th Century; Marion Dorn.  
 
Dorothy Todd, the influential journalist and Editor of the magazine British Vogue, first brought Dorn to the public attention in 1925 and christened Dorn the ‘architect of floors’. Renowned for her ’sculpted rugs’, this lecture will reveal Dorn’s various commissions from the 1920s to the 1960s, which included amongst others, designs for the Savoy Hotel Group in London, Eltham Palace (the former Tudor royal residence that was transformed by the millionaires Stephen and Virginia Courtauld), the London Underground and the White House in Washington DC.  
 
In addition to her designs of wall hangings, carpets and rugs, Dorn also produced wallpaper and graphics, having studied graphic design at Stanford University prior to coming to live and work in London. We will explore her extraordinary career and position her place as a designer whose name should be for ever enshrined in the history books of British 20th century Art Deco. 

Pamela Campbell-Johnston has an MA Hons Art History, St Andrew's University.  
Over 30 years of lecturing experience to undergraduates, adult groups, and to Friends and Patrons of the Royal Academy of Arts as part of the RA’s Adult Education Department. 
Also conducted numerous guided tours, residential trips and focused gallery talks on individual works of art. Specialises in British Domestic Architecture and Modern British Art - with a particular love for the 1920s and 1930s. A permanent career at Royal Academy of Arts for 12 years. Work experience also undertaken at Bonhams, Art Loss Register and National Trust.  

Now a freelance art consultant and lecturer. Recently curated a collection for the Lansdowne Club. 

In the nineteenth century, photography struggled for recognition as an artistic medium on a par with painting and photography, but through its instantaneity, its potential for mass reproduction and its sheer versatility, it became the dominant visual medium of the early twentieth century. This lecture considers a range of great images produced since 1900, by photographers as diverse as Cartier-Bresson, Weegee, Robert Capa, Garry Winogrand and Edward Burtynsky. The photographs were taken for different purposes, sometimes using different processes, some in colour and others in black and white, but they have one thing in common: they show us the world in novel and unexpected ways.  

Barry Venning is an art historian whose interests and teaching range from the art of late medieval Europe to global contemporary art. He has published books, articles and exhibition catalogue essays on Turner, Constable and European landscape painting, but also has an ongoing research interest in postcolonial art and British visual satire. He works as a consultant and associate lecturer for the Open University. His media work includes two BBC TV documentaries, radio appearances for BBC local radio and abc Australia, and a DVD on Turner for the Tate.  

Gold in South America had a spiritual importance. Its brilliance evoked the Sun — the golden disk that nourished the Earth. In Peru and Colombia, goldsmiths made some of the most spectacular treasures of the ancient world. Cast and hammered, gold was transformed into sacred offerings for tombs and temples. Europeans, by contrast, saw gold as a commodity — the ultimate symbol of wealth. For decades, Europeans searched in vain for El Dorado, the legendary Golden One. Although many golden treasures were melted down for bullion, magnificent works of art are preserved in the museums of Peru and Colombia.  

Chloe Sayer is a freelance specialist in the art and culture of Latin America. Has lectured in the UK, Canada, Ireland, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand. Has curated exhibitions, and assisted on TV documentaries for BBC and Channel 4. Has made collections in Mexico and Belize for the British Museum, and is Research Associate in the Department of World Cultures at the Royal Ontario Museum. In 2016 she was awarded the prestigious Ohtli medal by the Mexican government for her long-standing commitment to Mexican culture. Her many publications include Mexican Textiles (British Museum Press, 1990), Arts and Crafts of Mexico (Thames & Hudson, 1990), Focus on Aztecs and Incas  (Watts Books, 1995), The Incas - The Ancient World (Wayland, 1998), Textiles from Mexico (British Museum Press, 2002), and Mexico: Clothing and Culture (Royal Ontario Museum, 2015). Has also published articles in travel guides, newspapers and magazines. 

In Danish art history, the period between 1800 and 1850 is one of great achievements. The artist C. W. Eckersberg pioneered a new painting and was soon followed by many of his students, such as C. Købke and J. T. Lundbye. They created works of art that depicted the changing Danish society, especially the rising bourgeoisie. They also dropped history painting to focus on genres such as landscape painting. As they turned their attention to remote places in the Danish land, they revealed the beauty of their native land.      

Biography:

Dr Caroline Levisse is an art historian based in London. She was born in France where she studied art history before moving to Copenhagen. In Denmark, she focused on research work and completed a PhD on the relations between art and religion in contemporary Scandinavian art. After graduating in 2013, she moved to London and started teaching art history with adult education providers. She has since developed a range of courses focusing on 19th and early 20th century Western art. She has published articles in French and English in academic journals as well as magazines and newspapers, such as Church Times and Arts sacrés.

The invention of the printing press in the early 1450s provided the ability to reproduce black and white images for book illustrators and the print collection market. However, this may have seemed like a backward step for consumers when hand-illuminated manuscripts were still available in vibrant colour. It could only be a matter of time until colour printing was invented. This lecture tracks the origins of this development, from the introduction of tinted paper to a true chiaroscuro print and explains how the image of Saint George was at the centre of the new technology.

Biography:

Dr Alison Barker taught History and Art History at further and higher education for eighteen years before her current role as a Frontline Support Assistant at the University of Essex, Albert Sloman Library. She speaks widely to diverse groups on many historical and art historical topics, and has led guided tours at the British Museum and the National Gallery. Alison wrote her PhD thesis on the depiction of Saint George in art and has published work on his image in both England and Italy. Her forthcoming book, The Dissemination of Saint George in Early Modern Art will be published by Routledge in 2025.

In sixteenth-century Venice, Tintoretto, helped by his studio assistants, produced work so quickly that he was nicknamed ‘Il Furioso’ (“The Furious”) by his contemporaries. He had received almost no formal training. Without the benefit of an apprenticeship in the studio of a major artist he had to find work the hard way: by under-cutting prices and delivering faster than his competitors (who included Titian and Veronese).

Biography:

Julia Musgrave got her first degree in Chemical Engineering and went on to become a Chartered Information Systems Engineer and IT project manager. In 2008 she decided that life was too short for just one career and decided to become an art historian. She now has a Graduate Diploma in the History of Art from the Courtauld Institute of Art and an MLitt in ‘Art, Style and Design: Renaissance to Modernism, c.1450 – c.1930’ from the University of Glasgow. She gained her PhD at the University of York for her research into the involvement of Roger Fry and the Bloomsbury Group and the social networks of the British art world in the development of the Contemporary Art Society from 1910 to 1939. She teaches Art History at the City Literary Institute (City Lit) and is Co-Director of The London Art Salon.

It is not known exactly when Advent was first acknowledged as part of the Church’s calendar, but it appears to be a tradition that was started sometime in the late 5th century. Etymologically, Advent is derived from the Latin adventus – coming, arrival - and for many people today, as in the past, it is a time for reflection and spiritual preparation for the birth of Christ on 25th December. Over the centuries Advent has attracted many customs and traditions, and has also inspired a wide range of fine prose and poetry, as well as some first class music. The lecture follows the ever-evolving traditions of Ad-vent and samples a range of inspired poetry and music.

Biography

Peter Medhurst appears in the UK and abroad as a musician and scholar, giving recitals and delivering illustrated lectures on music and the arts. He studied singing and early keyboard instruments at the Royal College of Music and at the Mozarteum in Salzburg

Why do some paintings retain their glowing colours for centuries whilst others darken or fade in a matter of years? How do artists become good craftsmen and women? Does craft still matter in an age of synthetic pigments and digital reproduction? This lecture describes and explains the materials painters use, the various techniques they employ to preserve their work and what happens when things ‘go wrong’. We explore in detail the technical, practical and historical aspects of the painter’s craft, from choosing the correct support, pigments and medium, through to varnishing, framing and conservation.

Biography:

BA(Hons) in Fine Art, Liverpool School of Art; MA in History of Art, Birkbeck College, London. Lecturer at the National Gallery since 2004. Has lectured on the history of European art and architecture at Somerset House, taught courses on art and architecture at London colleges (The City Literary Institute and Bishopsgate Institute) and is a regular gallery and museum guide for U3A. Steven is also a painter.

For centuries, scholars have pondered why Rome conquered and held on to the province of Britannia for almost 400 years.  It is clear, from the time of Julius Caesar, Britain was to become a major stage on which Roman generals and emperors could parade their martial prowess, celebrating numerous victories over the, often, troublesome inhabitants of these Isles.  It is also known from ancient sources that Britain was known for its wealth in metals and agriculture when the Romans invaded under Claudius in AD 43.  Historians have subsequently made quite a play of the importance of Britain’s mineral wealth to the Romans.  However, largely overlooked is Britain’s vital role as a source of food for the Romans on the Continent, especially in the late Roman period.  Through numerous and varied artefacts, this lecture will show why Rome really needed Britain and how the Romans tried desperately to keep the province in the closing decades of the Western Roman Empire.

Biography:

Sam Moorhead is the National Finds Adviser for Iron Age and Roman coins in the Portable Antiquities and Treasure Section at the British Museum. Before joining the British Museum in 1997 as Staff Lecturer for Archaeology, he taught Classics and Archaeology; he is an Honorary Lecturer at the Institute of Archaeology, UCL. He has excavated widely in the Mediterranean and Britain, concentrating on the Roman and early Mediaeval periods. Serving on numerous councils, he has been Chairman of the Palestine Exploration Fund and Honorary Secretary of the Roman Society. He has lectured to numerous organisations in Britain, including learned, literary, historical and archaeological societies, and has been a Guest Lecturer on many cruises. Recently, he has written The Roman Empire and The Frome Hoard, and co-written AD 410 – The Year that Shook Rome (all British Museum Press), The Romans who shaped Britain (Thames and Hudson), 31 BC, Antony, Cleopatra and the Fall of Egypt (British Museum Press) and A History of Roman Coinage in Britain (Greenlight Publishing). He is currently rewriting the standard reference for the coinages of the emperors Carausius and Allectus and is involved in a fieldwork project in Devon. Please contact via email in the first instance.

Patrick will explore the rich musical traditions of Venice. Claudio Monteverdi not only transformed the music at the Basilica of San Marco but also led the way in the creation of a new art form - opera. We shall look at and listen to works from the other musical geniuses who developed the musical life of San Marco such as Gabrieli and Lotti, as well as tracing Monteverdi’s successors in the creation of Venetian opera, including Cavalli and Albinoni. We shall also examine and hear music from Antonio Vivaldi, the other towering figure of Venetian music, who created music both for the opera stage and the female musicians of the Ospidale della Pietà.

Biography:

Patrick Craig is a Vicar Choral at St Paul’s Cathedral. For twenty years he combined this with an international career singing over a thousand concerts with the world-renowned early music consort The Tallis Scholars. He also sings with the award-winning group The Cardinall’s Musick. He founded and conducts this country’s leading all-female professional choir, Aurora Nova. He has conducted concerts for the BBC Proms, the Brighton, Lichfield and Aldeburgh Festivals, and with the City of London Sinfonia. As a Cambridge history graduate with a lifelong interest in the arts, he has gone on to lead choral workshops for amateur singers across the world, where he places music in its historical and cultural context. He regularly lectures for the St Paul’s Adult Education programme and for John Hall’s Venice Courses, which have allowed him to incorporate his interests in theology, art and poetry.  In 2020, when his singing and conducting work disappeared overnight as a result of the Covid pandemic, Patrick poured all his experience into online presentations which have raised vital funds for the Help Musicians Charity.

John Ruskin, the leading critic and aesthete, wrote in the 1850s that photography could never be Art. This lecture traces the struggle to overturn that view, beginning with the Pictorialist school of Victorian photographers and closing with the recent emergence of photographic art inspired by digital technology. Along the way we examine the contested virtues of colour images and the present revival of old-fashioned film cameras.

Biography:

Brian Stater lectured at University College London for 25 years, retiring in 2021 as a Senior Teaching Fellow. His principal academic interest lay in the appreciation of architecture and he has a lifelong enthusiasm for photography. He therefore offers lectures to The Arts Society on each of these subjects. He has written on architecture for a wide range of publications and an exhibition of his own photographs was held at UCL. Brian is a former member of the Association of Historical and Fine Art Photography. He works with a range of cameras, including a pre-War Leica as used by his great hero, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and many others. Brian is an engaging and amusing speaker who seeks to entertain as well as inform his audience.

What is Chinese painting? What makes it Chinese and why is it different from Western painting? In this lecture we will look at paintings from the Tang dynasty (618-907) to the Qing dynasty (1644-1911) and at the ideas that shaped a unique pictorial language. Landscape painting was considered the superior subject for painting, as it was felt it could best express moral and cosmic principles. The Chinese word for landscape painting is sanshui (山水画), meaning mountain-water painting. Landscape painting was to harmonise yin with yang, mountain with water.

Biography:

Born 1958. Painter, trained at Royal College of Art. Exhibits internationally. Work in collections around the world. Lived, exhibited in Japan for two years (1998-2001), China for eight years (2007-2015), where he continues to be represented by two galleries. Lectured widely in China on contemporary art in Britain and own work, and for Christie’s in Hong Kong: The Impact of Western Contemporary Painting on Far Eastern Painting. From 1994 to date: Lecturer, BA Fine Art Painting and MA Fine Art, University of Brighton; From 2001 to date: Lecturer, Certificate in the History of Art, University of Oxford (Materials and Techniques of Western Painting). Currently represented by the Fanxi Delarue Gallery, France.

In this talk we examine the situation of artists in Europe at the end of the Second World War and the exciting diversity of art that emerged in the 1950s ranging from Art Informel (the European equivalent to Abstract Expressionism) to Socialist Realism. We’ll look at the work of Alberto Giacometti and Germaine Richier, Francis Gruber and Bernard Buffet, Jean Helion and Andre Fourgeron, the Kitchen Sink School in Britain and the new British sculptors such as Lynn Chadwick and Reg Butler, the expressive work of Wols, Jean Fautrier and Henri Michaux, the gestural art of Bram van Velde, Hans Hartung and Pierre Soulages in France and the work of Antoni Tapies and Eduardo Chillida in Spain, Lucio

Biography:

Colin Pink has a BA in Philosophy and Politics from the University of Southampton and a MA in the History of Art from Birkbeck, University of London. He specialises in twentieth century and contemporary art in Europe and North America. He lectures at Morley College London. He has also curated exhibitions of contemporary art and has published four books of poetry: Acrobats of Sound, 2016, The Ventriloquist Dummy’s Lament, 2019, Typicity, 2021 and Wreck of the Jeanne Gougy, 2021.

Using the extraordinary fourteen-foot-long printed panorama of the north bank of the Thames created by the Buck brothers in 1749, this lecture will take us on a journey along the early Georgian river from Westminster to the Tower of London. The luminous paintings of Canaletto will bring the journey to life in sunlit colour and the highly detailed map created by John Roque in 1747 will be our constant guide. Along the way we will encounter wharves, warehouses, watermen and water closets, dukes, criminals, cranes and churches, and even a lost palace or two.

Biography:

Peter has a History of Art degree, an MA in London history, a PhD in the cultural history of an English Criminal, and qualifications in the teaching of adults. Until recently Principal Librarian at Guildhall Library, he has for 20 years lectured on a broad range of topics including the history of English books, portraiture, and London history. Peter has appeared on TV and radio as a consultant on the 18th century criminal Jack Sheppard,  on the history of English food, and on Shakespeare’s First Folio. His most recent publication, The Curious Cookbook, was published by the British Library. Peter is currently writing a book on Eating out in Georgian London. 

This talk is on how magicians have appeared in art throughout the centuries, whether in paintings, satirical prints or cartoons. Early artists used the magician to symbolise the mysterious and the unknown, associating them with astrology. In the 16th century, Pieter Bruegel and Hieronymus Bosch produced two of the most famous and striking pictures of the conjurer performing the Cups and Balls trick. The 18th and 19th century saw a proliferation in engravings and lithographs showing the magician both indoors and on the streets. Bringing it right up to date there are examples of how cartoonists and satirists delight in linking politicians with skulduggery with images of them featuring Sawing a Woman in Half, Vanishing illusions or pulling a Rabbit out of the Hat. Some of the tricks talked about are performed by Ian.

Biography

Ian Keable gained a First Class degree from Oxford University, qualified as a Chartered Accountant and then became a Professional Magician. He is a Member of The Inner Magic Circle. In 2014 he published Charles Dickens Magician: Conjuring in Life, Letters & Literature. He now divides his time between performing magic, giving talks and researching and writing. 

His latest book is The Century of Deception: The Birth of the Hoax in Eighteenth-Century England.

Goya’s long life and career spanned the reigns of four Spanish monarchs, and much social and political upheaval. Until his late forties his main work was designing subjects for the royal Tapestry works in Madrid, but by the 1790s he branched out into portrait painting, political satire, and experimental works. He was an energetic and restless genius whose painting reflected the turbulence of his age, and his work is still relevant today.

Biography

Historian, art historian, and painter, Gail Turner is passionate about Spain and Spanish topics. She has been a long-time lecturer for The Arts Society, and before Covid she taught on courses at the V&A, and for Art Pursuits, the National Gallery and the Art Fund. She has lectured on Cambridge University Summer Schools, the Courtauld Institute Summer Courses, Inscape, and for many arts organisations in Europe. In the past she led tours to Spain for The Arts Society and Martin Randall Travel. Gail lectured in the Prado and Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid in the 1980s, and was Deputy Curator of Keats Shelley Memorial House, Rome, before that. She was also once a Christie’s consultant in Illuminated Manuscripts. In 2015 Gail was awarded the Encomienda de Isabel la Católica (the equivalent of the CBE) by the King of Spain for promoting Spanish culture among British audiences. She is President of The Arts Society Colchester. 

We might assume that our modern Christmas owes much to the Victorians. In fact, many of our favourite Christmas traditions date back much further. Carol-singing, present-giving, mulled wine and mince pies were all just as popular in Tudor times, and even Father Christmas and roast turkey dinners have their origins in this period.

The Tudor Christmas was a time of feasting, revelry and merrymaking, a twelve-day-long festival, over which the Lord of Misrule held sway, and convention was thrown to the winds. Christmas was so beloved by English people that its traditions survived remarkably unchanged in this age of tumultuous religious upheaval. (This lecture is based on my book with Alison Weir A Tudor Christmas, published by Jonathan Cape, 2018)..

Siobhan Clarke BA has worked for Historic Royal Palaces for 20 years delivering tours and lectures on Hampton Court, Kensington, the Tower of London and the Banqueting House, Whitehall Palace. Her experience includes education sessions and tours for schools, universities, corporate and private clients.  

She has lectured for the British Museum, National Trust, U3A, Arts Society and Smithsonian and featured on BBC Radio Woman's Hour and Television's Secrets of Henry VIII's Palace. Her published work includes: A Tudor Christmas, in collaboration with Alison Weir, (2018), The Tudors: The Crown, The Dynasty, The Golden Age with Linda Collins (2019), King and Collector: Henry VIII and the Art of Kingship (2021) and she is currently working on Gloriana: Elizabeth I and the Art of Queenship.

Walter Sickert (1860-1942) holds a special position in British Art as the creative link between two different ages. The pupil of both Whistler and Degas, Sickert went on to influence (at one remove) many of the great figures of twentieth-century painting from Bacon and Freud, to Auerbach and Hockney. Matthew Sturgis is the author of acclaimed biographies of three of the great cultural figures of the late nineteenth century: Oscar Wilde, Walter Sickert and Aubrey Beardsley. He was also a towering figure in his own right. And his life was one of extraordinary richness: as a teenager he acted with Henry Irving, and helped Ellen Terry choose her costumes, he taught Aubrey Beardsley and Winston Churchill how to paint (though not at the same time), he delighted Max Beerbohm with his wit, and inspired Virginia Woolf with his paintings. This talk charts Sickert’s life and achievement through his shifting ideas about how best to be an artist.

Matthew Sturgis is the author of acclaimed biographies of three of the great cultural figures of the late nineteenth century: Oscar Wilde, Walter Sickert and Aubrey Beardsley. (His biography of Oscar Wilde was shortlisted for the 2019 Wolfson History Prize.) He has also written a history of the English Decadence of the 1890s. A.N. Wilson - writing in the Times Literary Supplement - described him as ’the greatest chronicler of the 1890s we have ever had.’ His historical and cultural interests also led him to write a book - When In Rome - chronicling the history of how Rome has been visited, and the artworks tourists have admire there, over the millennia - from Classical and Medieval times, via the Renaissance and the Grand Tour, to our own era.

Tuesday 14th November at 10:30 am at the New Windmill Hall, Upminster RM14 2QH.

This event is open to visitors for a fee of £8:00. 

Please visit our web site:

https://tashavering.org.uk/Lectures/FutureLectures.aspx

Facebook:   https://www.facebook.com/groups/199870022175485

 or contact us at info@tashavering.org.uk, or telephone 01708 221903.

An American artist in London, James Abbott McNeill Whistler was a leading proponent of the idea of "art for art's sake". He signed his paintings with stylized monogram of a butterfly with a long stinger for a tail – as much a symbol of his love of Japanese art as his assertive and sometimes combative nature. 

Having lived and worked with the Paris avant-garde he settled in London in 1859 having created a distinctive Post-Impressionist style at a time when many of his British contemporaries had yet to come to terms with Impressionism. Whistler’s art moved painting towards abstraction, sparked a renaissance in printmaking and gave us the Peacock Room, a masterpiece of interior design. 

Inspired, influential, and infuriating, his art was full of subtle delicacy, he had a wide social network of friends and family and yet, if crossed, could be a formidable opponent. He mastered the art of making enemies. 

Julia Musgrave got her first degree in Chemical Engineering and went on to become a Chartered Information Systems Engineer and IT project manager. In 2008 she decided that life was too short for just one career and decided to become an art historian. 

She now has a Graduate Diploma in the History of Art from the Courtauld Institute of Art and an MLitt in ‘Art, Style and Design: Renaissance to Modernism, c.1450 – c.1930’ from the University of Glasgow. She gained her PhD at the University of York for her research into the involvement of Roger Fry and the Bloomsbury Group and the social networks of the British art world in the development of the Contemporary Art Society from 1910 to 1939. 

She teaches Art History at the City Literary Institute (City Lit) and is Co-Director of The London Art Salon. 

.Following in the footsteps of Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro and Pierre Auguste Renoir we analyse what was modern about Impressionist landscape paintings: their experiments with colour theory, new synthetic pigments, and, most importantly, the distinctly modern landscape that they chose to depict. We’ll be travelling by train, in and out of the Gare Saint Lazare in Paris, with boating trips and balloon excursions thrown in. We’ll also consider the distinctively modern independent exhibitions mounted by the Impressionist group in Paris from 1874 onwards, and beyond that, Monet’s exploration of a new kind of modern landscape painting during the 1890s, epitomised by his eries of Poplars, Haystacks and Rouen Cathedral, and culminating, at the and of his life, with his monumental Water Lilies.   

Dr Lois Oliver studied English Literature at Cambridge University, and History of Art at the Courtauld Institute of Art, completing an MA in Venetian Renaissance Art and a PhD thesis on The Image of the Artist, Paris 1815-1855. She worked at the Harvard Art Museums before joining the curatorial team at the V&A and then the National Gallery, where she curated several exhibitions and contributed to major re-displays of the collections. Currently Curator of Paintings and Sculpture at the Royal Academy, Associate Professor in History of Art at the University of Notre Dame in London, and a Visiting Lecturer at the Courtauld Institute, Lois also writes audio and multimedia tours for clients including the National Gallery, Royal Academy, Royal Collection, and Tate, and has appeared on BBC Radio and TV. Also a keen violinist, Lois plays regularly with Kensington Chamber Orchestra and the Endellion Festival Orchestra 

Angels don’t speak, they sing. And they have inspired much wonderful music. Patrick will investigate their roles as guardians, messengers and fighters through imaginative music by Britten, Elgar and Mendelssohn. Angelic words also feature in regularly repeated liturgical texts that Patrick sings daily in St Paul’s Cathedral, such as the Sanctus and Te Deum. These will give us an opportunity to explore and enjoy angelic music by composers such as Bach, Mozart and Walton. Patrick will call on some of the world’s finest art and poetry to further expand this journey into the heavenly realm.

Patrick Craig is a Vicar Choral at St Paul’s Cathedral. For twenty years he combined this with an international career singing over a thousand concerts with the world-renowned early music consort The Tallis Scholars. He also sings with the award-winning group The Cardinall’s Musick. He founded and conducts this country’s leading all-female professional choir, Aurora Nova. He has conducted concerts for the BBC Proms, the Brighton, Lichfield and Aldeburgh Festivals, and with the City of London Sinfonia.

As a Cambridge history graduate with a lifelong interest in the arts, he has gone on to lead choral workshops for amateur singers across the world, where he places music in its historical and cultural context. He regularly lectures for the St Paul’s Adult Education programme and for John Hall’s Venice Courses, which have allowed him to incorporate his interests in theology, art and poetry.

In 2020, when his singing and conducting work disappeared overnight as a result of the Covid pandemic, Patrick poured all his experience into online presentations which have raised vital funds for the Help Musicians Charity.

Albrecht Dürer is among the stars of graphic art, of printmaking, in the Germanic lands. Based in influential Nuremberg, one of the centres of the Reformation and a hub of publishing, Dürer rose to prominence artistically and in the city’s government. Some of his prints established images which still pack a visual punch today. He went to Venice twice in his career and meeting Giovanni Bellini there changed his artistic life. Venice opened his eyes to the Italian Renaissance and guided him to have great aspirations for the art of his homeland. Although known for his stunning drawing of The Praying Hands, he was massively important as a printmaker in woodcut and engraving: he invented etching and drypoint in printmaking. Larger than that, he knew all of the key movers of his day, including Erasmus and was on talking terms with the Holy Roman Emperor. A fascinating character who represents the inner turmoil of Europe in transition.

Hilary Williams was formerly Print Room Superintendent at the British Museum, now Art History Education Officer. Lectures for BM, London Borough of Bexley and Wallace Collection. Liaison officer at British Museum with The Arts Society. Founding Artistic Director of The Arts Society of North Kent Evening. Guides Special Interest Private Tours of State Apartments Buckingham Palace.

Babylon: the very name is evocative. Once one of the greatest cities in the ancient world, a vanished metropolis which lay ruined and deserted for over 2000 years, its history has become bound up with myth and legend but it has never been forgotten. The Biblical accounts of the Tower of Babel, Daniel in the Lions’ Den, Belshazzar’s Feast, the Fall of Babylon, the Whore of Babylon, and classical references to the city’s great walls and the Hanging Gardens have struck a chord artists throughout the centuries. This lecture looks at some of the art which these stories inspired and also at the real Babylon, in southern Mesopotamia, beside the River Euphrates, as explored and excavated since the 19th century.

Sue Rollin works as a tour guide and lecturer in India and the Middle East, and as a freelance interpreter for the European Union, United Nations and other international organisations. Formerly staff interpreter at the European Commission, Brussels, and tutor and lecturer in Assyriology and Ancient History at the Universities of London and Cambridge. Has worked as an archaeologist. Publications: Blue Guide: Jordan and Istanbul: A Traveller's Guide.

The shell is an attribute of Aphrodite who was conveyed to Paphos on a shell; of Triton who calmed the waves by blowing a conch trumpet and of the pilgrim as seen, for example in scallop shells at the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. As exotic and beautiful objects of wonder, realistic groups of shells were faithfully reproduced within Dutch still life paintings of the 17th century. Real shells featured in grottos, such as that in Florence’s Boboli Gardens and as a decorative motif appear in European interiors of the Baroque and Rococo. Exotic and fragile shells were traded from the eastern seas, carved as cameos, ground into artists’ pigment, and mounted as drinking vessels in precious silver gilt, to be admired as wonders of the natural world in princely Cabinets of Curiosities. Shell specimens were collected during the 18th century Enlightenment by Sir Hans Sloane and were recreated as exquisite porcelain sculptures or as painted details on delicate porcelain vases and dishes. Mother-of-pearl has long been utilised as a decorative inlay on rare works of art from India and Japan and tortoiseshell was manipulated as a veneer for fine furniture. The lecture considers the beauty of shells in all of their variety.

Anne Haworth is a lecturer at the Victoria and Albert Museum, the British Museum and the Queen’s Gallery. She is a visiting lecturer for Regent's University, Sotheby's Institute and SOAS. Since 2008, she has been a member of the London faculty of Eckerd College, Florida, teaching Art History and is also an accredited Arts Society lecturer. For ten years she guided private evening tours of the State Rooms at Buckingham Palace. She lectures extensively for private groups, guides museum tours in London and has lectured on William Morris for the British Council and British Higher School of Art and Design in Moscow.

After studying Modern History at Durham University, she trained and became a senior specialist in ceramics at the head offices in London of Bonhams (1981-1986) and Christie's (1987-1995). From 1995 to 2002, she was resident in Shanghai, China and gave lectures on the history of the China trade and European Chinoiserie to the international community of diplomats and expatriates in Shanghai and Beijing. On returning to London in 2002, she worked on a short project cataloguing Chinese ceramics at Kensington Palace and became Hon Membership Secretary and Treasurer of the French Porcelain Society.

From the Alhambra to William Morris, patterns can be gorgeous, yet pattern has often been dismissed as “mere ornament” in comparison with painting. We will discover what a mistaken view that is as we look at the ideas that inspired some of the great pattern inventors and traditions from around the world. We’ll see that whilst some glorious effects depend on very simple patterning procedures, others can be wonderfully clever, as we watch patterns evolving across the screen in beautiful animations. 

David Philips studied History at Oxford, and from 1968-82 worked for Nottingham Castle Museum. From 1982-98, Lecturer in Museum Studies and Art History at University of Manchester. Published a book about museum practice with Manchester University Press, Exhibiting Authenticity (1997).  

Cubism can be confusing. Never truly popular, the most influential art movement of the Twentieth Century can sometimes appear difficult and strange. Is this because there is something inherently ‘unlovable’ about Cubism? Not at all! Cubism needs simply to be explained for its beauty to be appreciated. This lecture sets out clearly and succinctly the theory behind Cubism, its various phases and the different types of Cubist painting, collage and sculpture in the years c.1907-25. This is an accessible introduction to the subject, illustrated with artworks by the most famous Cubist artists - Picasso, Braque and Léger - and those lesser-known including some working in Britain. 

Steven has BA(Hons) in Fine Art, Liverpool School of Art; MA in History of Art, Birkbeck College, London. Lecturer at the National Gallery since 2004. Has lectured on the history of European art and architecture at Somerset House, taught courses on art and architecture at London colleges (The City Literary Institute and Bishopsgate Institute) and is a regular gallery and museum guide for U3A. Steven is also a painter 

The foods we eat at Christmas have a long, curious and visually spectacular history. This lecture narrates and illustrates that history from Medieval boar’s head and brawn, by way of highly decorated seventeenth century mince pies to the almost forgotten Twelfth Night Cake. Medieval illuminated manuscripts, paintings and prints from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries, and illustrations from cookery books provide us with images of some of the lost glories of the British Christmas feast. 

Peter has a History of Art degree, an MA in London history, a PhD in the cultural history of an English Criminal, and qualifications in the teaching of adults. Currently Principal Librarian at Guildhall Library, he has for 20 years lectured on a broad range of topics including the history of English books, portraiture, and London history. Peter has appeared on TV and radio as a consultant on the 18th century criminal Jack Sheppard and on the history of English food. His most recent publication, The Curious Cookbook, was published by the British Library. 

Paul Nash is one of the most important British modernist artists. He is often associated with art movements such as Neo-Romanticism and Surrealism but his work remains hard to categorise. He worked as a war artist in both the First and Second World Wars and forged his own distinctive approach to landscape. 

His work makes the homely uncanny and though he depicts specific places they inhabit an imaginative realm that reveals a mystical relationship to the world. Nash is a poet of the visual who creates his own world of symbols that is both natural and unnatural, a landscape of mystery that reveals, in the words of Coleridge: ‘the translucence of the eternal in and through the temporal’. 

Colin Pink has a BA in Philosophy and Politics from the University of Southampton and a MA in the History of Art from Birkbeck, University of London. He specialises in the interrelationship between the history of ideas and the history of art and has lectured on aspects of modern art at a wide range of cultural organisations: Putney School of Art and Design; the Temenos Academy; APT Studios; Mascalls Gallery; the Museum of Futures, Surbiton; the Jerwood Gallery, Hastings and the De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea. He also curates exhibitions and has published two books of poetry: Acrobats of Sound, 2016 and The Ventriloquist Dummy’s Lament, 2019. 

Velázquez (1599-1660) was the leading artist of Spain’s Golden Age. His unique talent is viewed from his youth in Seville through his long career as court artist, courtier and friend of the Habsburg King Philip IV of Spain. His total works number less than 130 paintings, yet they show great variety and versatility. The formality of the court is evident in his projects for royal palaces, while his keen observing eye is revealed in iconic court portraits, less formal paintings for palaces and hunting lodges, landscapes, frail Habsburg children, and proud dwarves and courtiers. His great painting Las Meninas ('The Maids of Honour') epitomises Philip’s court, and some say, the art of painting itself. 

Historian, art historian, and painter. Lecturer for The Arts Society since 1992, lectures regularly for the V&A High Renaissance and Baroque course, Art Pursuits, and the Art Fund. Has taught on Cambridge University International Summer Schools, the Courtauld Institute Summer Courses, Inscape, Gainsborough’s House and other arts organisations. She has led tours to Spain for The Arts Society and other tour companies. Lectured in the Prado and Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid 1983-5, was Deputy Curator of Keats Shelley Memorial House, Rome 1978-80, manager of the Courtauld Slide Scheme 1977, and a Christie’s consultant (Ill. MSS) 1976. Gail has recently given a course at the National Gallery, on Sorolla. In 2015 Gail was awarded the Encomienda de Isabel la Catolica (the equivalent of the CBE) by the King of Spain for promoting Spanish culture among British audiences, and was recently elected President of The Arts Society Colchester. 

The light-filled canvases of Impressionist painter Berthe Morisot capture the pleasures of modernity: fashionable ballgowns, afternoons spent boating on a lake, children playing. Yet, her contemporaries perceived a connection with the eighteenth century. Renoir considered her ‘the last elegant and ‘feminine’ artist that we have had since Fragonard.’ Surveying the 1896 posthumous retrospective of her oeuvre, Paul Girard declared ‘it is the eighteenth century modernised.’ Eighteenth-century art fell from favour following the French Revolution, but was ‘rediscovered’ in the mid-nineteenth century by collectors including Louis La Caze and Hippolyte Walferdin. Morisot copied works by Boucher; she experimented with red chalk, a technique closely associated with Rococo drawings; she also admired the English painters Gainsborough, Reynolds and Romney, whose work she first encountered on honeymoon in the Isle of Wight and London. This lecture traces Morisot’s engagement with eighteenth-century art and culture, and highlights what set her work apart from that of her predecessors.  

Dr Lois Oliver studied English Literature at Cambridge University, and History of Art at the Courtauld Institute of Art, completing an MA in Venetian Renaissance Art and a PhD thesis entitled The Image of the Artist, Paris 1815-1855. She worked at the Harvard Art Museums before joining the curatorial team at the V&A and then the National Gallery, where she curated several exhibitions. Currently Curator of Paintings and Sculpture at the Royal Academy, Associate Professor in History of Art at the University of Notre Dame in London, and a Visiting Lecturer at the Courtauld Institute, Lois writes audio and multimedia tours for clients including the National Gallery, Royal Academy, Royal Collection, and Tate, and has appeared on BBC Radio and TV. Also a keen violinist, Lois plays regularly with the Endellion Festival Orchestra. 

Pip Burley 

Pip Burley pays tribute to the lives, words and music of Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, Cole Porter and George Gershwin-four men who made a unique contribution to the Great American Songbook during the first half of the twentieth century. 

Come and enjoy their beautiful songs- as fresh and inspiring today as when they were first written and hear about the lives of these musical geniuses who still cast their spell upon us. 

Songs featured include: 

‘Old Man River’, ‘Don’t Believe Me’, ‘Can’t Help Loving That Man’, ‘Bill’, ‘Smoke Gets in Your Eyes’, ‘Cheek to Cheek’, ‘How Deep is the Ocean’, ‘Always’, ‘White Christmas’, ‘Change Partners’, ‘Night and Day’, ‘I Get a Kick out of You’, ‘In the Still of the Night’, ‘Love for Sale’, ‘I’ve Got You Under My Skin’, ‘ Summertime…’ 

…and many more! 

Lavishly accompanied by slides and videos of their lives and music, with performances by some of the greatest artists of all time-and occasional illustrations on the piano. 

Pip Burley began his musical career playing Rock'n'Roll in the 60s and 70s as well as working with the big bands - including Sydney Lipton, Joe Loss and Ken Mackintosh. He went on to compose and record music for commercials, theatre, film and television and, in 1990, won an Ivor Novello Award for Best Television Theme music for The Darling Buds of May - a TV series he also produced (discovering Catherine Zeta-Jones in the process). Other television successes include the multi-award winning series A Touch of Frost, the most watched police series of all time, created for and starring David Jason. As a sideline he also managed to start and run an advertising agency! 

Since then Pip has been lecturing widely about his career based on his book Briefest Encounters and, more recently, has devised a series of six talks entitled 'The Golden Age of Song', featuring the lives and music of six great composers of popular song, lavishly illustrated with slides, videos and occasional demonstrations on the piano. These lectures have been presented both ashore and on cruise ships.  

     With Just A Thread And A Needle 

         Susan Kay-Williams 

 This constantly changing lecture features a wide variety of work from the RSN Collection and from current and recent students. Showcasing many embroidery techniques this lecture will open eyes as to just what can be achieved with a needle and thread. 

No prior knowledge of embroidery is needed to enjoy this lecture that shows the imagination and skill of RSN students in creating everything from selfies in stitch to a White Walker for Game of Thrones and from realising children’s stories to crafting jewellery. 

This lecture is updated frequently with new works. 

Susan Kay Williams is chief Executive of the Royal School of Needlework, based at Hampton Court Palace. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and the Chartered Institute of Marketing and in 2015 was made a Fellow of the Society of Dyers and Colourists in recognition of her work on the history of dyes. Susan has a longstanding interest in textiles, especially colour, and published her first book, The Story of Colour in Textiles (Bloomsbury) in 2013. She has extensive lecturing experience and has been invited to lecture in the USA, Canada, China, Japan and Taiwan as well as for the V&A and across the UK.  

William Kent trained as an artist before spending ten years in Italy, where he studied painting, classical buildings and Italian gardens. Back in London in 1719, he became part of Lord Burlington’s household and his career flourished. As well as painting ceilings for Chiswick House and Kensington Palace, he worked as an architect, garden designer and interior decorator, and designed some impressive pieces of furniture. His gardens at Rousham (Oxfordshire) and Stowe (Buckinghamshire) are the finest surviving examples of the new landscape garden. 

Caroline Knight is an Architectural historian, trained at the Courtauld and specialising in 16th to 18th century English and Scottish architecture. Lecturer at the V&A on year courses and short courses, and lecturer for the Art Fund, and for the Royal Oak Foundation in the US. Researched and wrote a history of Kensington Palace. Contributed to a book on the Cecil family, and has written several articles on architectural and social history and the history of travel. Wrote London's Country Houses (2009). Contributed a chapter to a history of the Royal Academy (Yale, forthcoming).

Alfons Mucha quite literally wrote the book on Art Nouveau. Documents Décoratifs became the definitive text on the subject. Everything that is best about the style- elaborate ornamentation with themes from nature, fine draftsmanship, idealised feminine subjects, symbolism and allegory. It all flourished through him at the highest level. The Master of the Decorative Panel and one of the four great masters of the Poster in the Belle Epoque, he learned much from Sarah Bernhardt, created jewellery, stained glass windows and the Great Slav Epic. 

Focusing on the role of posters and poster artists in the history of advertising, this global-award winning Creative Director of international advertising agencies has lectured extensively on design, illustration and photographic styles as they have influenced the building of brands. He has himself created posters for major brands including British Airways, Nestlé, Sony, General Motors and Shell. His travel writing and photography has appeared in various airline magazines as well as Time. He has also written and produced several hundred TV and Radio commercials and corporate video programmes. A member of Winchester DFAS.

Lecture 10.30am 

Caravaggio: Murderer or Genius?

Caravaggio’s paintings inspired many artists during his lifetime and would go on to influence many more, from Orazio Gentileschi to Peter Paul Rubens, Gerard van Honthorst and Rembrandt.

Each absorbed a different aspect of his work. His style spread across Europe and gave rise to the inter-national movement known as ‘Caravaggism’. Yet for many, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio is famed as much for his art as for his criminal record. Was it the violence of his times or his own violent spirit that inspired the dramatic lighting and intense naturalism of his work? This lecture follows the dramatic incidents of the artist’s life and looks at why and how his influence spread so far.

Julia Musgrave got her first degree in Chemical Engineering and went on to become a Chartered Infor-mation Systems Engineer and IT project manager. In 2008 she decided that life was too short for just one career and decided to become an art historian.

She now has a Graduate Diploma in the History of Art from the Courtauld Institute of Art and an MLitt in ‘Art, Style and Design: Renaissance to Modernism, c.1450 – c.1930’ from the University of Glas-gow. She is currently working towards her Ph.D. at the University of York the involvement of Roger Fry and the Bloomsbury Group in the development of the Contemporary Art Society from 1910 to 1937. She is a lecturer in Art History at the City Literary Institute (City Lit).

Rescheduled from 9th June 2020  Start at 10.30am

The lute holds a special place in the history of art: painters of the Italian Renaissance depicted golden-haired angels plucking its delicate strings, evoking celestial harmony; in the sixteenth century, during the rise of humanism, the lute was a becoming pastime of educated courtiers, as depicted by the likes of Holbein and Titian; throughout the seventeenth century, the instrument continued to play a key role in emphasising the intimate, debauched and transient pleasures of interior scenes by Jan Steen and portraits by Frans Hals. This lecture looks at the lute, and other musical instruments, as devices to express various aspects of the human character throughout the ages.

Adam Busiakiewicz is an Art Historian, lutenist and lecturer. After completing his Bachelor’s Degree in History at UCL in 2010 he held the position of Head of Historical Interpretation (curator) at Warwick Castle. He left the castle in 2013 after winning a full AHRC studentship to pursue a Master’s Degree in Fine and Decorative Art at the Sotheby’s Institute of Art, London. He is currently pursuing his doctorate in Art History at Warwick University after winning a CADRE Postgraduate Scholarship in 2017.

Earlier in December 2014 he became the youngest Guide Lecturer at the Wallace Collection, where he regularly gives talks, tours and lectures to both public and professional audiences. He has also given lectures at the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, London, and is organising a series of talks there on the lute in paintings in 2018.

Adam is currently planning a publication on the Grevilles of Warwick Castle, and has had articles published by the British Art Journal, The Sidney Journaland Hispanic Lyra. He was also the Editor of the Georgian Group's 80th Anniversary Exhibition catalogue entitled Splendour! Art in Living Craftsmanship (2017).

The London Christmas season was invented at Covent Garden. The first theatre on the site was the home of Harlequin and Columbine and 300 years on Harlequin and Columbine are still dancing in The Nut-cracker. Most of what we now consider to be quintessential Pantomime – principal boy, fairy tales, transformation scenes and the dame, can be traced back to the operas and ballets put on at Covent Garden during its first 200 years. Panto has moved on to the Palladium, but you can still see its basic components in the seasonal operas and ballets the Royal Opera House puts on every year: Rossini’s Cenerentola (Cinderella), for example, or Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel, Tchaikovsky’s Sleeping Beauty or Ash-ton’s Cinderella. The repertoire changes every year and this lecture is updated to include current ROH Christmas offerings.

Sarah Lenton has spent her working life in the theatre, principally at the Royal Opera House, Glynde-bourne and English National Opera. She writes programme articles and websites, she gives lectures on the operas and ballets in the rep. and does live opera broadcasts and podcasts for BBC Radios 3 and 4. She has written and directed many shows, including more than 20 for the Royal Opera House Linbury Studio Theatre and for Glyndebourne Touring Opera. She is also a cartoonist.

Endlessly autobiographical, Spencer (1891-1959) noted, ‘my longings became pictures’. One of Britain’s greatest painters, he was a visionary artist whose name became synonymous with Cookham, the picturesque Thameside village he immortalised, which for him was the scene of heavenly visitations. Cookham shaped his work throughout his career, as the setting for subject pictures as well as beautiful realistic landscapes. He also created remarkable images of two World Wars. His mural decorations at the Sandham Memorial Chapel, Burghclere, commemorating the First World War, are one of the great achievements of twentieth century painting. His turbulent private life can be traced through his figure paintings. 

An art historian who has written widely on Stanley Spencer, including a book on his autobiographical Scrapbook drawings. A trustee of the Stanley Spencer Gallery, she has featured as a talking head on television and radio and acted as the historical adviser to BBC television and Arts Council films on Spencer, and her work is frequently cited in the art historical press. For many years, she was also Curator of the Old Speech Room Gallery, Harrow School. The gallery has a distinguished collection of antiquities and fine art, for which she researched and published a series of catalogues. She curated over 80 exhibitions and ran a thriving gallery arts society for the boys, taking them on over 200 visits to museums and exhibitions in London.

The Heidelberg School shelters under its own unique umbrella taking their academic influences equally from the Royal Academy School in London and the French Impressionists. Key members were Tom Roberts, Arthur Streeton, Frederick McCubbin and Charles Conder whose art evolved from the informal, evocative and naturalistic into a nationalistic expression. In 1901 McCubbin bought a cottage on Mount Macedon, its surroundings became the inspiration for some of his best known works, the family named the property Fontainebleau. Its guest list ranged from Ellen Terry and Dame Nellie Melba to his myriad students who camped in the gardens.

Caroline has lectured in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, USA, Europe, Japan and on cruises to the Baltic, Mediterranean, Caribbean and Indian Ocean. In 2017 she returned to The Arts Society in New Zealand. Lectures for the University of Cambridge ICE (Course Director for International Summer Programme), the Royal Horticultural Society, museums, and specialist travel companies. Consultant designer specializing in evoking historic, artistic and symbolic references. Author of 11 books including Water Lilies and Bory Latour-Marliac, the genius behind Monet’s water lilies; Impressionists in their Gardens; Follies of Europe: Architectural Extravaganzas; Monet at Giverny and Icons of Garden Design. Theatre productions: How does your garden grow Mr. Shakespeare and Impressionists in their Gardens: living light and colour. Presenter and contributor on television and BBC Radio 4. 2017 recipient of the Herb Society of America ‘Elizabeth Crisp Rea Award’.

In 1539, Sinan became Chief Architect to the court of Süleyman the Magnificent. Master and servant transformed Istanbul and other Ottoman towns and cities. During his 50-year career Sinan designed hundreds of monuments, including mosques, schools, palaces, mausolea, hospices, hospitals, bath-houses, bridges, aqueducts and caravanserais. In his prestige mosques Sinan made bold experiments with centralised domed spaces, windows flood the buildings with light and superb Iznik tiles decorate the walls. For his royal patron Sinan created Istanbul's grandest mosque, the Süleymaniye: Sultan Süleyman is buried in a mausoleum in the garden and the architect rests in a simple tomb outside. 

Works as a tour guide and lecturer in India and the Middle East, and as a freelance interpreter for the European Union, United Nations and other international organisations. Formerly staff interpreter at the European Commission, Brussels, and tutor and lecturer in Assyriology and Ancient History at the Universities of London and Cambridge. Has worked as an archaeologist. Publications: Blue Guide: Jordan and Istanbul: A Traveller's Guide.

Medieval cloisters, originally a monastic built space linking other buildings, have in spite of Henry VIII's  thorough Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 1530s, probably survived better in England than anywhere else. This is in large part because early on English cathedral communities both recognised their great usefulness and experimented with cutting edge architecture in building cloisters and in so doing created some extraordinarily beautiful spaces. This talk follows the development of the 15 or so cathedral cloisters in England with spectacular photographs. These will hopefully encourage visitors to cathedrals to look beyond the cathedral church buildings and more closely at the cloisters attached to them.

For eight years the Church of England’s Director of Church Buildings and Secretary of the Church Buildings Council and Cathedrals Fabric Commission, Janet has written two illustrated paperbacks to encourage greater enjoyment of these amazing buildings, Director's Choice, Churches of the Church of England and Director's Choice, Cathedrals of the Church of England and produced and presented on a TV series on cathedrals for PBS.

A Cambridge graduate in History and History of Art, Janet worked at Sotheby’s for nine years, was a trustee at the Churches Conservation Trust, the Museum of Fulham Palace and the Friends of the V&A and guided and lectured at the V&A. Janet set up and ran an architectural history course around visits to significant buildings. Janet has also given tours and lectured on secular architecture and fine and decorative arts.

Currently a trustee of the Priory of St John (Hospitallers) and a commissioning editor for Scala Heritage Publishers, Janet received an OBE for services to heritage in January 2017.

The exquisite paintings by Jan Vermeer (1632-1675) with their luminous colours, gradations of light and unpretentious subjects, are admired by artlovers everywhere of Vermeer’s serene, mysterious works and will put them into the context of their time in seventeenth century Holland.

Reading: Catalogue Vermeer Exhibitions: 1996 Washington/The Hague and 2001 National Gallery London

Chevalier, T., 1999 The Girl with the Pearl Earring Harper Collins 

BA Hons Courtauld Institute; Diploma: Study Centre for the History of Fine & Decorative Arts. Freelance lecturer in Fine Arts and tour-guide to Berlin, Dresden, Munich. Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Dresden Trust.

Frida Kahlo (1907-1954) and Diego Rivera (1886-1957) have iconic status in Mexico. Rivera's intricate visual narratives, rich with allegory and symbolism, adorn the walls of public buildings. Inspired by Aztec and Maya imagery, and by early Italian fresco painting, his vast murals combine social criticism with faith in human progress. Kahlo's work, unlike Rivera's, is small in format. Arguably Mexico’s most original painter, she made herself the principal theme of her art. Her paintings reflect her experiences and dreams. This lecture surveys the work of both artists; it chronicles their turbulent marriage and Mexico's history after the 1910 Revolution. 

Freelance specialist in the art and culture of Latin America. Has lectured in the UK, Canada, Ireland, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand. Has curated exhibitions, and assisted on TV documentaries for BBC and Channel 4. Has made collections in Mexico and Belize for the British Museum, and is Research Associate in the Department of World Cultures at the Royal Ontario Museum. In 2016 she was awarded the prestigious Ohtli medal by the Mexican government for her long-standing commitment to Mexican culture. Her many publications include Mexican Textiles (British Museum Press, 1990), Arts and Crafts of Mexico (Thames & Hudson, 1990),  Focus on Aztecs and Incas  (Watts Books, 1995), The Incas - The Ancient World (Wayland, 1998), Textiles from Mexico  (British Museum Press, 2002), and  Mexico: Clothing and Culture (Royal Ontario Museum, 2015). Has also published articles in travel guides, newspapers and magazines.

The history of this enduring and peculiarly British institution, from its origins in 16th century Italian commedia dell’arte through the influence of 19th century music hall, to the family shows that are still much loved today. On the way we examine the origins of some of the stories used in pantomime as well as such traditions as the (female) principal boy and the (male) pantomime dame. The talk is interspersed with personal anecdotes from the speaker’s years of working (and appearing) professionally in pantomime.

Ian Gledhill has had a very varied career, from designing underground railways as an engineer for London Transport, to appearing in pantomime with Julian Clary. In between he has worked in travel and tourism, music publishing, television, and especially the theatre, where he has been an actor, director, set designer, stage manager and opera translator. His main interests include architecture, history, transport and classical music, especially opera and operetta, and these are reflected in the wide ranging list of subjects for his lectures. He began giving lectures in 1997, and now gives on average around 140 a year. 

Tracey Emin shot to fame and notoriety with My Bed in 1999, taking up a role as the enfant terrible of the Young British Artists. She has since earned fortune and criticism in virtually equal measure, with important curators and critics supporting her work, whilst others have accused her of courting controversy and being self-indulgent in the autobiographical slant of her work. This lecture looks at some aspects of what is a wide-ranging and varied body of work and seeks to examine some of the reasons behind the antagonism Emin has faced.

BA and MA from Goldsmith’s College, and an MA (distinction) from Birkbeck College. Experienced guide at Tate Britain, Tate Modern, the Royal Academy and Greenwich. Lectures at Tate, Dulwich Picture Gallery, to independent art societies and on cruises. Leads art appreciation holidays.

Modigliani remains of the most popular artists of the 20th century. I discuss his short life in some detail looking at his early development and his arrival and life in Paris from 1906 to his death in 1920. Modigliani was at the centre of Bohemian Paris and was a close friend of Maurice Utrillo, Picasso, Max Jacob, Moise Kisling, Chaïm Soutine and many other painters and writers who made up Bohemian Paris. I discuss the influences on his painting and sculpture including Cézanne, African art and Cubism and show how he developed a highly individual style of his own. I look at his haunting portraits and sensual nudes while exploring the Bohemian life of Montmartre. 

Julian studied History of Art at Cambridge. Formerly Senior Lecturer and Head of Department at Croydon College of Art. Publications include Venice - the Artist's Vision (1990, 1995), The Art of Diana Armfield RA (1995), Dictionary of Scottish Painters (1990, 1998, 2001, 4th edition 2010), A Hand to Obey the Demon's Eye (2000), Scottish Watercolours 1740-1940 (1986, 1991), A Private View - David Wolfers and the New Grafton Gallery (2002). Interviews artists for the Artist Magazine and is a member of the International Association of Art Critics and The Critics Circle. A practising artist, he was elected to the Royal Society of British Artists in 1994 and appointed Keeper in 2010.

Wool, cotton and silk have each played a crucial role in the fortunes of Central Asia. Wool created the clothing and housing needed by the great nomadic cultures that were to dominate Middle Asia. Silk was more valuable than gold and used as currency, creating a network of trading routes that led to the first outbreak of globalisation. Cotton was the cause of Russian and then Soviet Colonisation and continues to cause controversy today as well as human misery and environmental catastrophe The felts, carpets, embroideries, robes and veils of the Silk Road stratified wealth, displayed religious and political entrenchments and changed the fortunes of this fascinating part of the world; a meeting place between Mohammed and Marx.

Biography

Chris was born in Turkey (hence his middle name) and spent his childhood there and in war-torn Beirut. After school, Chris spent two years at sea before studying Media and journalism at Leicester University. He then moved to Khiva, a desert oasis in Uzbekistan, establishing a UNESCO workshop reviving fifteenth century carpet designs and embroideries, and becoming the largest non-government employer in town. After a year in the UK writing A Carpet Ride to Khiva, he moved to the Pamirs in Tajikistan, training yak herders to comb their yaks for their cashmere-like down, spending three years there. Next came two years in Kyrgyzstan living in the world’s largest natural walnut forest and establishing a wood-carving workshop. Chris has recently finished rowing and studying at Oxford and survived his curacy at St. Barnabas in North Finchley, but is now taking two years out to focus on writing fiction, with several novels published and more on the way. He also lectures for the Art Society and leads tours to Central Asia to pay the bills. He is missing a large chunk of his heart which will forever remain in the -stans. 

‘The secret of my influence has always been that it remained secret’ – Salvador Dalí

Like the Renaissance artists he admired, Salvador Dalí did not restrict his creative output to painting but was also a writer, poet, engraver, sculptor, architect, photographer, theatre designer,  and jewellery designer. As well as designing the latter, Dalí selected the materials to be used, focusing not just on the colours or the value of the material, but also on their symbolic meanings. Jewels such as ‘El cor reial’ (1953, The Royal Heart) have become iconic works and are considered to be as exceptional as his paintings. He also was an omnivorous reader who was as interested in science as he was in art and in this his work also reflects the Renaissance artist he admired. This lecture explores the work of Dalí the designer and science enthusiast – a Renaissance artist in the 20th century.

Julia Musgrave got her first degree in Chemical Engineering and went on to become a Chartered Information Systems Engineer and IT project manager. In 2008 she decided that life was too short for just one career and decided to become an art historian.

She now has a Graduate Diploma in the History of Art from the Courtauld Institute of Art and an MLitt in ‘Art, Style and Design: Renaissance to Modernism, c.1450 – c.1930’ from the University of Glasgow. She is currently working towards her Ph.D. at the University of York the involvement of Roger Fry and the Bloomsbury Group in the development of the Contemporary Art Society from 1910 to 1937. She is a lecturer in Art History at the City Literary Institute (City Lit).

We are all familiar with playing cards but how aware are you that they go back to the 14th Century? There are surviving decks from as early as 1475. The English took  their cards from the French and The Worshipful Company of Makers of Playing Cards is one of the many trade guilds of the City of London that protected the importation of French and other foreign cards into England. The Company was granted its charter in October 1628.

Playing cards become truly interesting when the face of the card deviates from the Standard i.e. when the Kings and/or Queens, for example, are recognisable Monarchs. Thus the potential of a pack of cards as a medium of communication, propaganda or education was not lost on our forefathers. Events in 1678 involving the infamous Dr Titus Oates is represented in a 52 card pack entitled The (Horrid) Popish Plot, the first of several political decks published to capitalise on both the popularity of gaming and the hunger for news and information.

Among the many popular playing card themes are also ‘transformation’ cards in circulation since the start of the 19th century and still challenging the artists of today. The very first and best known series of transformation cards are those by J C Cotta in 1803. 

A fascinating world so many bridge players are not even aware of!

In this talk Andrew shows that with the turbulent political times between 1870 and 1929 culminating with final collapse of the European and Russian Monarchies, countless astonishing art and jewel collections were dispersed looted or sold.

Fortunately this coincided with the growing wealth and power of America’s millionaires, who were themselves intent on creating palaces of their own, filling them with the greatest paintings and furniture and weighing down their wives and providing their daughters with a dowery of the finest of royal jewels.

Andrew explains how many of these fabulously wealthy heiresses married into the British Aristocracy, bringing many of the treasures with them, and how with the decline of the British Empire and Aristocratic power these legendary jewels have again been parted with and now can be seen in the world's great museums, for all to enjoy.

Andrew Prince has had a passion for the jewellery since he was a small child. In fact his enthusiasm can be traced back to the time when, at the age of three, he swallowed his one of his mother’s pearl earrings having found her jewel box hidden from him in a cupboard. The very first piece of jewellery he created was a ring made of copper wire pulled from the back of a television. He presented it to his grandmother (it turned her finger green and gave her a rash). He then created a necklace for his mother using beads taken off her wedding dress (she was not at all happy).

In 1980, when he was nine, Andrew's mother took him to the Princely Magnificence exhibition at the V&A, exhibiting Renaissance jewels dating from 1500 to 1630. It proved a revelation. Dazzled by the splendour and opulence of the jewels on show, Andrew decided then and there that creating jewellery was what he wanted to devote his life to. His passion for jewellery grew when, in 1984 on his first ever visit to Bond Street, Andrew viewed an exhibition by Castellani and Giulianoe at Wartski & Co’s. While there, he was allowed to handle beautiful 18th century gold boxes and magnificent imperial Russian pieces by Fabergé. In 1987, just before leaving school, he took time off to visit Geneva to view the astonishing Sotheby’s auction of the Duchess of Windsor's jewellery collection. Here, for the first time, he held pieces created by some of the world's greatest jewellers, fashioned from only the finest of stones and set in designs of outstanding quality. For the young Andrew, it was a life-changing experience.

In August of that year, two weeks after his 16th birthday, Andrew started work in London’s Bond Street, working for The Antiques Roadshow expert Ian Harris. Under his guidance, Andrew developed an appreciation for jewels that were valued for their quality of design and craftsmanship, rather than for how much the stones in the piece were worth. He then joined the renowned contemporary jeweller Elizabeth Gage and worked with her on the design and production side. Through her and her private collection, Andrew was able to see and handle rare and extraordinary stones with names such as Sphene, Andalusite, Spinel and Dioptase, many of which are far rarer than diamonds. Elizabeth Gage was to have an enormous influence on Andrew's sense of what was possible within the realm of jewellery design.

Andrew's taste for fine 'costume jewellery' can be traced back to an antique market, where he came across a late Victorian brooch set with what he initially thought were emeralds and diamonds. They were, in fact, crystal and green glass set in silver and gold. He realised that beautiful jewellery didn't require expensive stones, and that it was the elegance of the design and the quality of the workmanship that truly mattered. Private commissions then started to trickle in. The trickle turned into a flood, as celebrities such as Michael Jackson (a large crystal and pearl shoulder jewel) and Shirley Bassey (necklaces) were seen wearing Andrew's creations.

In 2002, the V&A commissioned a collection of jewels to accompany the resplendent Tiaras, Past and Present exhibition which became one of their most popular exhibits. The exposure gained by the show then led to Andrew's jewellery appearing in film.

In 2005, he was asked to make tiaras and jewellery for Mrs Henderson Presents starring Judy Dench. In 2009, pieces were commissioned for The Young Victoria starring Emily Blunt and Miranda Richardson. In 2012, he was chosen by the creators of Downton Abbey to supply a large collection of jewellery for the third series. The characters played by Maggie Smith, Shirley Maclaine, Elizabeth McGovern and Michelle Dockery were all adorned with elegant tiaras, combs, earrings and necklaces designed and created by Andrew Prince.

The Picturesque was the final phase of the English Landscape Movement. The serpentine curves, smooth lawns and clumps of trees so characteristic of Capability Brown, were now considered insipid and dull by a generation with an enthusiasm for caverns, gorges and untamed nature and a taste for rugged wildness. It was the landscape version of the gothick novel originally penned by Horace Walpole the creator of Strawberry Hill gothick architecture. The aim always was to engender, in reader and viewer, a pleasurable frisson of fear and alarm. Humphry Repton, who turned to landscape gardening in 1788, realised that the picturesque theory was all very well as theory, but what his clients, over a period of thirty years, actually required was practicality and above all beauty. Terraces, flower borders and ornament around their houses gradually became the formal gardens of the nineteenth century.

Inchbald School of Design 1990 (Dip ISD). Head Gardener, Old Rectory Farnborough 1990-92. Faculty Director, Design History, Inchbald School of Design. Garden Designer 1992-. A lecturer for The Arts Society since 1995. Organiser of The Arts Society's garden study days and tours in UK and Europe. Organises tours to the best private gardens in the UK, Italy, France and South Africa. Garden Mania, a book on garden ornaments, published in 2000.

For over forty years, Winston Churchill was a keen amateur artist. He painted from 1915, right down to his retirement in the 1950s. His landscapes record almost every country which he visited as a distinguished statesman. In Britain he painted at Blenheim, where he was born, at Port Lympne and Trent Park, where he stayed, and at Chartwell, his final home. Abroad, he painted in France and Belgium, from the trenches of World War One, and after that, on the French Riviera. He also painted in Europe, at exotic locations like Morocco and Egypt, and in Canada and the United States. Churchill’s wit is legendary: there are even books about it, but I shall not announce his best lines in this summary of a lecture!    

Churchill discussed painting with Noel Coward, who was another keen amateur artist for over forty years. Indeed, Churchill persuaded Coward to stop using watercolour and convert to full oil painting. In Britain, Coward painted in or near his two Kentish homes: Goldenhurst, and his magnificent house overlooking the sea at St Margaret’s Bay. He painted in Italy, at Venice and Portofino, but also three other Mediterranean locations which have yet to be identified. Perhaps you will be able to identify them? The majority of his paintings are of Jamaica: he retired and had two homes there. Coward of course used wit and humour in many of his plays and musicals, as well as in his personal life.

An art historian and archaeologist. In the 1980s he became Founder- Chairman of the Friends of Shakespeare's Globe. In 2005 he was one of two Lecturer Representatives on the The Arts Society Advisory Council and also Vice-Chairman of Folkestone. He is the author of four books on the Impressionists in England, and one on the Frost Fairs on the Frozen Thames. His latest book My Father, the Man who Never Was features in his latest lecture.

Everyone is aware about “1066 and all that” without necessarily knowing the exact facts about this momentous event. This lecture will present in details the historical, cultural and artistic aspects of that unique masterpiece, the Bayeux Tapestry, which provides posterity with such a startling testimonial of peoples’ lives in the late Viking age. 

BA Hons Courtauld Institute; Diploma:Study Centre for the History of Fine & Decorative Arts. Freelance lecturer in Fine Arts and tour-guide to Berlin, Dresden, Munich. Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Dresden Trust.

Join award-winning Food Historian and Artist Tasha Marks as she discusses her company AVM Curiosities. Bridging the worlds of food, art and history Tasha’s work ranges from museum-style exhibitions and sculptural installations, to interactive lectures and limited-edition confectionery. 

With clients including the V&A, The Royal Academy of Arts, The National Gallery and the Barbican, Tasha’s talk will review her unique position in the cultural landscape, touching on each of her distinctive projects and discussing the highlights of each one. As well as a strong emphasis on storytelling and history, the talk will comment on how to introduce the senses into the museum space, the rituals of eating, and why sugar was one of the original artistic mediums.

Tasha Marks is an award-winning food historian and artist, who explores the relationship between food, art and history. Her practice, AVM Curiosities, champions the use of food as an artistic medium, with projects ranging from museum-style exhibitions and sculptural installations, to interactive lectures and limited-edition confectionery. Recent academic achievements include publication in the Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets, where Marks authored the entry on Mrs Beeton, one of the Victorian era’s most influential cooks.

Encouraged by photographer and gallery owner, Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O’Keeffe abandoned her teaching career to eventually become one of America’s most popular artists, with an international reputation. She is best-known for her dramatic, and sometimes controversial, pictures of flowers in which she enlarged the smallest of petals to fill the entire canvas and arrest the viewer’s attention. Her legacy of some 900 paintings, also embraces New York’s skyscrapers, her almost abstract treatment of Lake George’s landscape and the sun-bleached animal bones depicted against the rugged New Mexico landscape. After visiting New Mexico regularly from 1929 it became her permanent home from 1949. Here she worked right up to the end of her life; she died at 98. Throughout this long and productive career, she was conscious of European avant-garde trends in art, but remained faithful to her own unique vision of the natural world.

Bernard has a BA (Hons) in History and an MA in History of Art. Having taken early retirement, commenced a new career as an art history tutor for the WEA. Has taught French and British art of the 18th and 19th centuries, as well as women's art, for the past eight years. Lectured to various societies, and guided parties around galleries in London and Paris. In addition to teaching, he is currently researching artists working in Sussex in the 19th century, with a view to publication.

Tamara de Lempicka dazzled Paris’ artistic circles in the 1920s and 30s and seduced with her stylish portraits. These heady years saw her immortalise the atmosphere of wealth and decadence of Paris. Other painters oscillated between Cubism and Fauvism, but deLempicka was one of the few to be able to embody the decorative style of Art Deco in her paintings. Stunningly beautiful, she engaged in the world of fashion and photography, as well as presenting herself as the quintessential modern, independent young woman. She was glamorous and notorious, but her extraordinary talent confirmed her reputation as one of the most iconic painters of her generation.

MA V&A and RCA; PhD European University Institute, Florence. Having previously worked at the V&A and lectured there and for the University of Warwick, now lectures for the Open University. Has lectured widely in Britain; at the Courtauld Institute of Art and Museum of London amongst others, and to specialist groups including the Art Fund, the Ceramics Society, the Costume Society and the Ancient Monuments Society. She has also lectured in Europe, the USA (including Yale and the Huntington) and Canada and has numerous publications.

The pictures on gallery walls look so well-behaved, but there can be Bedlam behind the scenes. Based on my own and colleagues’ experiences, we relive the highs and lows of curatorial life. We find out what’s involved in a gallery make-over, dine (disastrously) with a Duke, discover a masterpiece - and are questioned by Chelsea CID as suspects in a massive art fraud. At the end of the day, the reward should be a gallery full of engaged visitors, and it does often happen - but not always. The incidents of daily curatorial life can be colourful, but in this talk they add up to a solid theme. What are the big issues that art curators face, and where should the whole business be going? 

Studied History at Oxford, and from 1968-82 worked for Nottingham Castle Museum. From 1982-98, Lecturer in Museum Studies and Art History at University of Manchester. Published a book about museum practice with Manchester University Press, Exhibiting Authenticity 1997. 

The Royal Danish Porcelain factory was championed by the King from 1779, and he commissioned in 1789 J. C. Bayer to paint the famous Flora Danica Service.

Figures were produced from the late 1770's but the high point came with the biscuit porcelain figures in 1830 inspired by the great Danish sculptor, Thorvalden.

The factory achieved fame in the 1889 Paris Exhibition with its subtle glazes and 'modern' style figures.

Freelance lecturer in ceramic, glass and the history of interior decoration in Europe, North and South America. Lectures at the Inchbald School of Design, the Interior Design School and for American University Groups, NT and Antiques Societies and Christie's Education. Guides groups through museum collections and country houses. Collects ceramics and glass. Diploma with Distinction in the Fine and Decorative Arts, Inchbald School of Design.

This lecture explores the story of the suffragettes through their ‘pro and anti’ portrayals in cartoons, postcards and paintings - as well as their own artistic productions. It will also consider the Suffragettes’ impact on the Houses of Parliament itself and how the Parliamentary Art Collection has responded to criticism that its own collection is too ‘male, pale and stale’. By turns amusing, infuriating, enraging and ultimately inspiring, you will come away from this talk with a new appreciation of how the campaign for equal electoral rights was won by and through art.

There will be no lecture this month due to new floor being laid in the hall.

This lecture explores how a musician from a relatively obscure German state came to transform the musical life of Britain, from his arrival in 1710 to his death in 1759, and beyond.He created some of the finest music for ceremonial occasions and during his lifetime was the one composer to whom people turned when they wanted to celebrate a national event. He invented the English oratorio which is central to much of the professional and amateur music-making up and down the country. The lecture explores this most British of composers and is illustrated with a variety of musical examples, some well-known, others less familiar.  

Roger was a chorister at Wells Cathedral School and a choral scholar at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he graduated with an honours degree in English.  He combined a teaching career with professional singing in London, and after obtaining a further degree in Music became Director of Music at Daniel Stewart’s and Melville College in Edinburgh.

After retiring in 2003 he returned to the south of England.  He is President Emeritus of The Stoke Poges Society and Chairman of Windsor and Maidenhead Decorative and Fine Arts Society.

Art UK was set up to catalogue every oil painting in public ownership in the UK. This unique and ambitious project involved visiting 3,000 collections across the country and photographing over 212,000 paintings. These paintings are reproduced in an acclaimed series of hardback catalogues entitled Oil Paintings in Public Ownership.

The paintings are freely available to view on the Art UK website (www.artuk.org). The lecture offers an insider’s view of the project and describes some unusual collections visited, intriguing paintings uncovered, detective work involved and assistance given by NADFAS members. Each lecture is tailored to reflect the locality of the venue.

Mary Rose gained an MA in Victorian Studies at Royal Holloway, University of London. Several of her arts-related essays and articles have been published, and she is a guide at Turner’s House in Twickenham and Dorich House Museum in Kingston. She was a founder member of The Arts Society of Richmond upon Thames. Since 2007 she has worked part-time on the unique arts project that is the subject of her lectures.

The Way of Tea, often translated as “Tea ceremony”, is considered to be the embodiment of Japanese culture. The architecture of tea hut and the attached garden, ceramics and other utensils were designed to reflect the ideals of Tea ceremony which was heavily influenced by Zen Buddhism. The aesthetic concepts wabi (simplicity, frugality) and sabi (tranquillity, patine of age) are most prominently expressed in the art of rustic ceramics which overturn the conventional standard of beauty.  This lecture will consider the intriguing nature of wabi and sabi that challenges our idea of art.  

Dr Meri Arichi studied Art History in London and Florence, and worked at Christie’s in Kings Street, London, from 1989 to 1993. She returned to university to study Asian Art at School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London in 1993, and completed a Post-graduate Diploma in Asian Art (1994), MA (1996) in History of East Asian Art, and PhD (2003) for her thesis on Shinto-Buddhist syncretic Art. She has been teaching History of Japanese Art in the Department of History of Art and Archaeology at SOAS as a Teaching Fellow since 2007. She has also run courses at the Birkbeck College, V&A, British Museum, and the Courtauld Institute of Art Summer School. She has led tours to Japan and lectured on cruises.  

Experience the story of gold and its significance and symbolism within the history of art - as the colour of the sun; the colour of divinity; the colour of status and the colour of love. From creations ancient and contemporary, sacred and profane - all that glitters is certainly gold…

Official Guide and Lecturer at Tate Modern, Tate Britain and Guildhall Art Gallery. Pallant House Gallery Lecturer. City Lit Institute Art History Tutor. Qualified Guide to the City of London, offering lectures and walks about many aspects of the arts for societies, corporations and private individuals. Member of the City of London Guide Lecturers Association. Co-author of the book Lord Mayor's Portraits 1983-2014 (2015). Alexandra’s background is in design having practised as a graphic designer running her own design consultancy for many years. BA Saint Martins School of Art, MA London College of Printing.

The ancient Maya of Central America created the most exquisite painted vessels. The scenes from these vessels give us a fascinating insight into the ancient life of the people. Aside from their beauty as objects of art, they aid both the archaeologist and art historian in understanding the context of the Maya universe, from palace scenes and sporting events, to mythology and tales of the underworld. In the absence of the wheel, the techniques of ceramic making will be discussed as well as their different styles and themes, thus confirming their place amongst the great painting traditions of the world.

Dr Diane Davies is a Maya archaeologist and honorary research associate of the Institute of Archaeology, University College London. She completed her PhD at Tulane University, New Orleans. Little is known about the Maya in the UK and so aside from carrying out research in Guatemala and teaching, Diane is an educational consultant for schools giving workshops to both teachers and children on the Maya. She has created award-winning resources, organizes trips to the Maya area and is also the Chair of Chok Education, a charity supporting the education of Maya children. Diane organises conferences on the Maya as well as lecturing to a variety of organisations, including the City Literary Institute, London and the Historical Association.

Given as gifts by the autocrat to his or her favourites or built as an expression of hubris by the newly rich, the Russian country house of the 19th century varied hugely in size, architectural style and, it must be said, in beauty. These houses, on vast estates, often situated hundreds of miles from the nearest city, were at the heart of totally self-sufficient communities, with up to 800 house serfs – among them artists, sculptors, musicians and specialists of every kind. The architecture of these extremely varied houses and the life of master and serf are explored in this lecture.

Brought up in Italy, France and Switzerland, she holds a first class degree in Italian from Trinity College, Dublin and a Masters degree in Imperial Russian history from Edinburgh University. Ran her own business for many years, finishing with a 5 year contract teaching at a US university. Now back in the UK, she lectures widely to history societies, university groups, special interest associations and on cruises. Her interests are the society, art and architecture of Imperial Russia; Italian history, art and culture; the English eighteenth century.

One of the most derided towns in England, renowned for its dullness, Basingstoke is distinguished only by its numerous roundabouts and absurd Modernist architecture. Rupert explains that the post-war planners who inflicted such features as ‘ the Great Wall of Basingstoke’ on the town, were politically motivated and bent on destroying all traces of the past.  He reveals the nobler Basingsstoke that is buried beneath the concrete, and the few historic gems that have survived the holocaust.  Hilariously told, it is a story that neatly illustrates the ugliest episode in England’s architectural history.  As Betjeman wrote prophetically, ‘ What goes for Basingstoke goes for most of English towns.

A prize winning historian who specialises in the domestic and social life of the past.  He graduated from University of London with a First Class Honours degree in History.  He is a best- selling author, writes guides to castles owned by English Heritage and Hampshire County Council and a series of  popular histories of places including Chawton, Jane  Austen’s village, and Basingstoke.  He is an experienced  lecturer, and occasional broadcaster, on a broad range of topics with a particular interest in architecture, interior design and costume.

This lecture explores the fashion for porcelain figure sculpture in the eighteenth century, beginning as a form of table decoration and subsequently moving to the mantelshelf and china-cabinet; and how these figures reflect eighteenth century society in miniature.

During the lecture you will meet characters from the Commedia del’Arte and the English stage, beggars and pedlars, exotic figures from distant lands, lovers and musicians, shepherds and shepherdesses, the gods of Olympus – even the odd monkey!

Jane has an MA in History of Art from University of London. Trained at the V&A and continues to lecture there.  She was a Senior Lecturer at Sotheby’s Institute of Art for 17 years , becoming a  Deputy Director of Sotheby’s UK.  She has lectured at many universities both here and abroad and on cruise ships, and interior design conferences in America

To mark the centenary of women first getting the vote which falls in 2018, this lecture will explore  the story of the suffragettes through portrayals in art and their own artistic productions, and will look at how contemporary artists choose to portray female politicians in our own time and the controversies surrounding these depictions

Caroline is an archivist, historian and author. She was formally Director of Parliamentary Archives at Westminster and a senior archivist  at the  National Archives at Kew. She is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquities  and the Royal Historical Society and has appeared on national TV and radio and reviews books for The Spectator.   Her first history book ‘ The Day Parliament Burned Down’, won thew Political Book of the Year Award 2013.

Clare is a curator specialising in the history of jewellery based in the department of Metalwork, Silver and Jewellery at the V&A.  Author of ‘ Jewellery form Antiquity to the Present’   ( 1996) and ‘ Jewels and Jewellery’ ( 2005 ) , she has contributed to Art Nouveau and Art Deco exhibitons at the V&A and International Arts and Crafts at the V&A in 2005.  She was the curator of the ‘Bejewelled by Tiffany ‘ ( Gilbert Collection 2006).  She has an MA in the History of Design from the Royal College of Art

Who is Santa Claus?  The familiar image of the jolly fellow with the white beard and red suit was to a large degree the creation of American illustrator Thomas Nast in the 1860s.  This lecture follows the various transformations of St Nicholas through 1,600 years of history.   Originating in Byzantine Turkey in the 4th century, the cult of  ‘ Nicholas of Myra’ was actually the result of two completely different Nicholases getting muddled up.  In 1807, when a bunch of Italian sailors snatched the saint’s relics and took them back to Puglia, ‘Nicholas of Myra’ became ‘Nicholas of Bari’.  Medieval Europe made St Nicholas one of the greatest miracle workers of all time.  His stories were panted everywhere.  Saving poor girls from prostitution, sailors from shipwreck, rescuing boys from kidnappers, clerks from murderous innkeepers and babies from boiling bath water......Nicholas became the Mr Fix-It of western sainthood.  Add a propensity for gift-giving and a feastday during Advent, and what do you get......?  Santa Claus.  The ideal Christmas lecture!

An independent art historian with BA in History from UCL, an MA in Early Sienese Painting and a PhD in History of Art from the Courtauld Institue.  She has over a decade of lecturing and teaching experience  including summer schools and public programmes for the Courtauld, Birkbeck and Christie’s Education as well as private study groups. She is a widely published author of books, essays and articles and has travelled extensively in Italy  and now divides her time between London and Assissi.

The work of women photographers has often been unfairly neglected.  This lecture seeks to correct that by examining the contribution of three outstanding British practitioners;  Julia Margaret Cameron, a Victorian pioneer; Jane Bown, a brilliant portraitist; and Fay Godwin, who excelled in landscape photography.  We also explore the work of two highly influential Americans: Dorothea Lange, who produced brilliant documentary images and Annie Leibovitz, who continues to both surprise and delight her audience.

Brian’s chief interests are photography, architecture and history and he combines all three in his lecturing career.  He has taught at University College London  since 11997 and became a NADFAS lecturer in 2003.  He is a member of the  Association of Historical and Fine Art Photograpy and an exhibition of his own work has been staged at UCL.  In an attempt to gain deeper understanding of the skills of some great photographers of the past, he has begun to work with a pre-war Leica camera as used by his great hero, Henri Cartier Bresson, and many others.

The magnificent Royal Academy Exhibition of 2016 opened the public eyes to the extent to which artists loved to cultivate their own gardens and how they were in turn inspired by them to create experimental work.  We will trace the parallel  developments in the history of gardening and the history of modern art from the Impressionism of Monet, Renoir, Pissaro and Morissot in the late 19th century, to the near abstraction of Matisse and Kandinsky in the 20th.

Lydia was born in Poland and achieved her BA in Fine Art at University of Newcastle and an MA in History of Art  from the Courtauld Institute in London.  She has lectured to diverse adult audiences, notably in London’s National Gallery and the MFA  Boston USA.  Her book on Great Themes in Art is being  considered for publication  by Merrell Books for worldwide distribution.

In the late 19th century, two cousins, Jewish immigrants from Constantinople, amassed remarkable collections of art.  One left his collection, including world famous  works of art like L’Absinthe by Degas, the other left his house and collection – one of the most important collections of 18th century French decorative art anywhere in the world – to the nation State  as a museum and a lasting memorial to his son.  This is an extraordinary story of a family dynasty,, money, art, social behaviour, obsession and tragedy.

Deborah is a former curator of the Schroder Collection, a private art collection.  Studied for her MA in  History of Art at the Courtauld Institute.  She worked for many years as as Academic director and lecturer for Christie’s Education.  Appears regularly as a furniture specialist on the Antiques Roadshow

By introducing broad issues that pertain to still life, this lecture aims to equip the audience with a range of questions which will help deepen their experience of viewing still life on subsequent gallery visits.  Traditionally , still life, as a genre, has been regarded as of the lowest status.  Why then have artists undertaken such works?  What are they attempting to expres?  The history of the genre is traced whilst challenge is made to its lowly status.  Hand-outs with questions are supplied after the lecture.

Emma initially trained as a Fine Bookbinder and Paper Conservator.  She has an MA in Fine Art and a PhD  in Art History.  She has spent over 20 years teaching art within Universities and since 2015 has been teaching art at a men’s prison.  She continues her work as an artist  undertaking still life paintings in oils and abstract paintings in acrylics.  In her lectures she approaches analysis of individual artworks from her experience of being a practising artist.

John is a lecturer and guide at both Tate Modern and Tate Britain.  He ran an MA cours e in Heritage Interpretation at St Mary’s University College.  Has lectured freelance to numerous art societies, to the National Trust and the Peggy Guggenheim Gallery in Venice.  Lectures on art for cruises.  In  2012 he wrote the new guidebook to the newly opened Strawberry Hill.

American glass artist Dale Chihuly is the super-star of the glass world.  With his passion for glass, his larger-than-life personality, his skills as a natural leader and educator, and his constant exploration of glass’s luminous qualities and colour possibilities, he creates extravagant, colourful and spectacular glass sculptures. 

Former Director of Broadfield House Glass Museum and one of the top authorities on glass in the country.  Lectures internationally to glass museums and collectors’ societies.

President of  The Glass Association which he was instrumental on founding.

Born into a Polish family, Misia was a virtuoso pianist taught by Gabriel Faure before marrying Thadee Natanson, owner of the magazine “ La Revue Blanche”.  She was painted by Toulouse Lautrec, Pierre Bonnard, Eduard Vuillard ( who was deeply in love with her) and Renoir. She later remarried a wealthy businessman and was able to finance Diaghilev’s Ballet Russe, becoming an integral part of the circle around Picasso, Stravinsky, Cocteau and Najinsky.  Her final marriage was to the Spanish muralist Jose Sert and she became Coco Chanel’s closet friend and confidante.  She was at the very heart of modern art and music in Paris.

Studied History of Art at Cambridge.  Formally Senior Lecturer and Head of Department at Croydon College of Art.  Author and practicing artist, he was elected to The Royal Society of British Artists in 1994 and appointed Keeper in 2010

Between 1885 and 1916, Carl Faberge made fifty jewelled eggs – Easter presents from Russia’s last two emperors to their wives.  Since the brutal murder of the last tsar and his family these eggs have become the most famous surviving symbols of the Romanov Empire; both supreme examples of the jeweller’s art and the vulgar playthings of a decadent court. Many went missing after the Revolution, to emerge in the store rooms of the Kremlin where they were identified as a source of much –needed foreign exchange. Their subsequent history holds up a mirror to the 20th century – eggs have been sold, smuggled, stolen and forged. Most have been returned to Russia but eight remain missing.  What prospect is there that they will ever immerge ? And,  if they do, will anyone believe that they are genuine?

Has written two works of narrative history, Stradivarius and Faberge’s Eggs published by Macmillan in the UK and Random House in the US and has lectured widely on both subjects.  His career has spanned investment banking, management consulting and five years as managing director of the publishing house established by his grandfather, Faber and Faber, where he remains on the board.

From patterns of collecting from Renaissance Italy to Northern Europe to the 20th Century pcychology of gestalt and gestaltung ( design) this lecture covers eclecticism, the classical tradition and the key tenets of successful combination of old and new works of art.

Studied History/History of Art at York University, followed by an MA in Fine and Decorative Art at Sotheby’s Institute, London.  A lecturer,  writer and curator, working in the visual arts field.

Christmas, as a time of celebration, has a very long pedigree.  The great midwinter festival, known to the Romans as Saturnalia, is still greeted with feasting and drinking throughout the 12 days of Christmas.  Wassail bowls and bobs, boars’ heads stuck with apples, carolling, mumming, riotous games in hall – all presided over by the Lord of Misrule.  Twelfth night signalled the end of the merry anarchy with great pies and rich fruit cakes concealing a bean and a pea.  Using  contemporary illustrations this lecture explores the sources and significances of these ancient customs and traditions.

Lecturer and consultant in the Cultural History of the Medieval, Tudor and Stuart periods. Specialist in medieval imagery and interior furnishing and decoration 1400-1700.

  Tour leader.  Former Keeper of the Social History Collections , Sheffield  City Museums. Lecture tours to USA and Australia.  Consultant on historic buildings and their interpretation to the National trust, English Heritage and Historic Scotland.

The  buoyant field poppies of Monet’s youth matured into his greatest decoration and memorial – Les Nympheas.  Through paintings and writings we trace the reactions of Monet and Renoir in France and the actions of Australian Impressionists  such as Frederick McCubbin and John Russell – all had sons at the Front.  The Franco-Prussion War  and WW1  framed the dissemination of Impressionism from France in the 1870s to its blossoming  across  the world  and the flower of its youth coming to die  on the 1914-1918 battlefields – now poignantly evoked  by poppies and water-lilies.

Caroline has lectured in the UK, US, Europe and Japan. Lectures for the University of Cambridge Institute of Continuing Education, The RHS, the English School of Gardening and travel companies. Author of nine books, she is a presenter and contributor on television and BBC Radio 4.

Silver specialist and auctioneer at Christies 1976-1984; Curator of Decorative Arts, Los Angeles County Museum of Art  1984-89:  Keeper of the Gilbert Collection at Somerset House  1997-2000; member of the Court of Goldsmiths’ Company London.

Freelance exhibition curator.  He has books on silver and numerous articles published.

For some 16 years, until his death in 1896, Lord Leighton ruled the roost as President of the Royal Academy.  He headed an elite group of Victorian painters who colonised Holland Park – George Frederick Watts, William Holman Hunt, Luke Fildes, Marcus Stone among them.  On the fringes of this clique lived Linley Sambourne, the Punch cartoonist, who did his best to keep up with the ‘Burnes-Joneses’!  Leighton and his rivals were working in a boom period for British art when the newly –monied wanted contemporary art to hang on their walls - trophies confirming their entrepreneurial success.   This lecture explores both the lavish studios of Victorian London as well as the art that characterised and created the House Beautiful

Dr Anderson graduated in Art History and Archaeology from Leicester University in 1978 and worked as an Archaeologist for 8 years before being elected to the Society of Antiquaries in 1997.  She has held numerous University posts and Fellowships and she is a consultant to Lord Frederick  Leighton’s Studio House, Kensington. She has published books on Roman pottery, Art Deco teapots and Edward Burne- Jones,  She has lectured on cruises and toured Australia.  Her television credits include BBC’s Flog It.

This lecture describes the items deemed necessary for gracious living in the 18th century.  The presentation illustrates snuff boxes and patch boxes, etuis and necessaries, fans, canes in various media: mother of pearl, tortoiseshell, enamel, gold, silver and soft paste porcelain. It looks at the leading craftsmen of the day and discusses how each such items were made, where they were made and how they were used.

Of course , none of the objects discussed was essential to everyday living, but in 18th century society it was social death not to flaunt your bonbonnieres or flutter your fan.

If you don’t know your etui from your necessaire, have never heard of pique work and would like to know why the estate of Frederick the Great numbered as many as 1,500 snuff boxes, then this lecture is for you!

‘Ted’ Seago’s refined landscapes personified a respect for the traditions of British landscape painting as well as impressionism.  In Britain he was part of a remarkable post-impressionist flowering that included the likes of Sickert, Munnings and Augustus John.  What made Seago quintessentially English was the great subtlety of his colour control and peaceful landscape compositions.  This refinement won him admiration from four generations of royalty and an international fan-base  that would cause his exhibitions to sell out on the first day.

But you won’t find his paintings in the Tate Britain, nor did his work ever find favour with the art establishment.

This lecture compares his work with those masters he most admired and the contemporary trends that he chose to ignore.  It tells of his lasting appeal, asking whether he should now be considered a great master of British art

 A mixture of art-historical analysis and scandalous anecdote, this  lecture  takes a generally light-hearted at changing attitudes to sexual morality down the ages, by examining the portraits and careers of some of history’s most notorious mistresses and courtesans.  It also charts the rather complex and ambiguous attitudes of art and society towards the numerous anonymous working girls at the lower end of the scale, by investigating how they have been represented in art at different times and places from the 17th to the 20th century

Tulips first appeared in Western Europe during the second half of the 16th century having originated in the Ottoman Empire and were different from any other flower known in Europe at that time.  Introduced to the Netherlands by the botanist Carolus Clusius their beauty and rarity made them highly desirable. The very wealthy obtained grand estates surrounded by flower gardens where the tulip took pride of place.  For some, their collection was to become an obsession. During the same period artists began specializing in flower paintings and many were purchased by those who perhaps wanted substitutes for the real thing.

The mania reached its peak in the winter of 1636-37  and then in February 1637 the bulb prices collapsed  abruptly and the trade in tulips ground to a halt.  Immediately after the collapse in prices engravers attacked the folly and ill-fortune of the speculators.

In spite of this the tulip remained very popular and flower painters continued to present the flower prominently along with newer varieties of plants and the high quality of Dutch flower painting continued into the 18th century.

The past few years have seen the meteoric rise of this extraordinary versatile young designer with his acclaimed Olympic Cauldron and iconic new London bus.  Over the last twenty years the Heatherwick Studio has used an intriguing combination of curiosity and experimentation to produce a vast range of solutions to design challenges around the world.  This talk looks at the problems presented, and the wonderful creative ways in which Heatherwick and his team have responded.

Ian is a Londoner with a passion for art and architecture.  An official tour guide at Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Guild Hall Art Gallery and St Paul’s Cathedral.  Also a qualified  and active freelance London guide and a member of both the City of London and Westminster Guide Lecturer Associations.

From 15th Century peasants drying their clothes , through 17th Century Frost Fairs on the Thames, to 19th Century skaters in the Bois de Boulogne, this lecture will trace how artists have responded to the challenges of winter.  Over 500 years of instructive shivering!

Ann has wide experience lecturing at home and abroad.  Earlier work includes cataloguing English watercolours and drawings for the Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester. research for the  Paul Mellon Foundation and university lecturing

The Old Vic Theatre is the third oldest theatre in London and the oldest theatre on the South Bank of the Thames. It first opened to the public in 1818 and has seen almost every kind of performance within its walls from ‘blood and thunder’ melodrama Via temperance sermons to world-renowned ballet performances and great Shakespearean productions.

In this talk we shall trace the history of the Coburg Theatre from its foundation in 1816 in Lambeth to its present day success led by Kevin Spacey. The young Princess Victoria made one of her first theatre visits to the new building and the theatre still affectionately uses the future Queen’s name. Famous figures of the 19C theatre graced its boards including Edmund Kean, Macready and Paganini. Emma Cons and her niece, Lilian Baylis turned it into a temperance hall and it housed a Working Man’s College. Baylis was responsible for giving British Ballet its first permanent home and she supported Opera. Above all from the First World War, the Old Vic became the home of Shakespearean performance. The Old Vic Company welcomed the greatest actors of the 20C including Edith Evans, John Gielgud, Ralph Richardson. Michael Redgrave and Laurence Olivier and later the ‘Vic’ was the birthplace of the National Theatre. Illustrated throughout by playbills engravings, paintings and photographs a unique theatre comes alive.

B O O K LIST

 The Old Vic Story       Peter Roberts       W.H.Allen 1976

 The Old Vic Theatre    George Rowell     Cambridge U.P 1993

Old Vic Drama 1937-1947  Audrey Williamson Rockliff 1957

After 38 years in education Frances worked for 10 years  as a tour guide  at the Theatre Museum Covent Garden and as a lecturer at the London Centre for Theatre Studies.  She is Chairman of both the Irving Society and the Henry Irving Foundation and is a tour guide at the Garrick Club

This lecture looks at the impact Charles Dickens had on the way Christmas was understood in the nineteenth century and the way it was represented pictorially. For Dickens Christmas was a vital channel for conveying deeply held values on childhood, the family, work, poverty and charity. His powerful message, particularly in 'A Christmas Carol,' affected the imagery of Christmas, from feasting and carol singing to Father Christmas himself. The urgency and humanity of Dickens' Christmas message reached beyond representations of Christmas itself to influence artists’ portrayals of the poor, goodwill and the human spirit, and Dickens’ Vision was an important influence in the development of the Social Realist school of painting.

Claire has worked at the Victoria  and Albert Museum and lectured at the University of Warwick and now lectures for the Open University.  She has lectured widely in Britain and Europe, the USA and Canada.  She has numerous publications in academic journals and edited volumes.

The audience is taken on a journey beginning in Outer Mongolia in the 5th century BC and follows the 11th century migrations from Central Asia, the cradle of weaving, into the Caucasus, Anatolia, Persia and Afghanistan. They will be introduced to the nomadic tribes of these countries and their woven rugs, carpets and dowry bags, with particular emphasis on those of the 19th century and earlier. These tribal weavings illustrate the skill of the women who produced exquisite works of woven art using vegetable colours and age-old designs, including cosmic and talismanic symbols, whilst living and travelling in primitive conditions and hostile landscapes.

The lecture explains how these rugs were made, the materials used and comparisons between natural and chemical dyes.                                              ‘

The lecture will also illustrate how nomadic tribal weaving began a swift decline under the demands of commercialism around 1900, with the use of mechanical designs and chemical colours. By the 19305, it had virtually ceased to exist in its spontaneous form. The tribal weavings of the 19th century and earlier represent the pinnacle of achievement and wonderful free expression of the art of the weaver. Today, these weavings are highly desirable and collectable works of woven art.

During the 1970s while working in Iran, Brain travelled extensively throughout that country as well as in Afghanistan and Turkey.  He has lived and worked amongst two tribal groups in  Iran making him one of the very few who have actually spent time ‘ in the field ‘

He has returned to  Iran several times in recent years, travelling and collecting amongst the Bakhtari, Qashqa’i and Shahsevan tribes.

He is based in the Cotswolds where he still acts as a lecturer, dealer and consultant, specializing in antique Eastern rugs, carpets and tribal dowry weavings.

The two Elizabeths – compares the lives and reigns of two very different, but extraordinary Queens, both dedicated to their people, swayed by events, experiencing very different childhoods and circumstances.

Caroline has worked in England, Italy and America, conducting cultural tours for Patrons of American Arts In stations and lectures on cruise ships and in America

Colours are radiant energies that affect us positively and negatively, and red is the most forceful of all. It is a very flexible colour, from demonic scarlet to angelic pink, from the wisdom of crimson to the extravagance of orange: its range of expression is extreme. Pure red is the colour of passion. This is because of its association of blood and fire. When we fall in love our blood is on fire! Like blood and fire, passion can be both creative and destructive. We will look at the way artists have used red to express these opposing energies. Some artists use red for purely aesthetic reasons. For example landscape painters will often use a dab of scarlet on a figure’s clothing so that the figure will not get lost amidst all the greens and browns. Other artists use red symbolically as in the paintings of Christ where he wears red to denote his sacrifice. Generally the aesthetic effects of s picture are entwined with its meaning. The history of red pigments is explored in conjunction with the analysis of paintings formal qualities. I guarantee you will leave this lecture never seeing red in the same way again!

Alexandra gained a First in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Art in 1985 and an MFA from Cambridge School of Art. In 2007 and 2012 she lectured in Australia for ADFAS. Alexandra is an art historian and a professional artist. Her lecture combine art historical knowledge with personal expertise in aesthetics and artistic techniques. It is this combination that makes her lectures so original and dynamic. She lives in Cambridge and is a studio artist at Wysing Arts Centre.

“Life without art is like dinner without wine. Why Bother?” Thomas Arvid In this lecture I examine paintings of wine being made and consumed in celebration since the time of Noah as well as looking at the contribution that ‘wine art’ makes to our colourful world. Who has not marvelled at the creativity and beauty of wine labels? Who could forget the wonderful artwork of Ronald Searle that adorned Oddbins’ catalogues for many years? My lecture also draws upon many other illuminating images and literary quotations: “And as Noah often said to his wife when he sat down to dine, I don’t care where the water goes if it doesn’t go into the wine.” G K Chesterton.

John has recently retired from the University of Bath where he was Director of Studies in the School of Education. He has highly effective communication skills and his ability to relate well to people makes him an impressive and confident speaker. He is now a freelance lecturer drawing upon his eclectic range of interests and enthusiasms. His highly professional digital presentations are very well illustrated, highly informative and presented with humour.

Queen Alexandra was one of the most celebrated women of her day and for almost 50 years was at the very top of the social whirl of late 19th and early 20th century life. She was known particularly for her astute choices in dress and for making the right decisions regarding her appearance whatever the occasion. This lecture will explore some of those choices, looking at surviving garments from museums around the world. It reveals some surprising elements to the life of this popular royal figure

Kate has worked with objects of dress and textiles in museums for almost 20 years in curatorial positions; currently Assistant Curator of Textiles at the Fashion and Textile Museum in Totnes Devon. Associate Lecturer at University College, Falmouth, teaching history and contextual studies to fashion and textile students. Publications include An Easy Day for a Lady (Costume, Journal of the Costume Society 2008 ) and Empire Dressing – the Design and Realisation of Queen Alexandra’s Coronation Gown (Journal of Design History, 2012) Kate is also one of the youngest practitioners of the dying art of producing handmade Honiton lace.

Writer, artist, musician, collector, Amelia Edwards tells, and is, a remarkable story. In 1873, she travelled the length of Egypt and drew, and recorded, her impressions of all she saw; publishing ‘A Thousand Miles up the Nile’ to great acclaim. From Dervish dancers in Cairo, to a midnight arrival at Abu Simbel, she carried her readers with her in engaging descriptions and evocative engravings. Using extracts from the book and her original watercolours, as well as illustrations by her contemporaries, we shall follow her on her remarkable journey.

Clive studied Egyptology at Cambridge. Lectures to PROBUS, Rotary Clubs, U3A, The City Literacy Institute and The Guilford Institute of University of Sussex. Has for 30 years been a Secondary Education teacher. Member of the Egypt Exploration Society, being awarded an EES Scholarship to The Saqquara Expedition of 1964-5

Experienced, retired specialist police and private detective, investigating art and antique crime. Formally the Recoveries Director for the Art Loss Register which operates an international commercial database of stolen cultural property. Formed his own company and developed training programmes designed to educate law enforcement officers in all aspects in this area of criminal activity. Has lectured to police conferences, customs officers auction house staff, museum employees, Interpol and the FBI.

Thirza Vallois is an expert on all things Parisian. She has lived in Paris most of her life and holds several post-graduate degrees from the Sorbonne including the prestigious aggregation ( a competitive doctoral-level teaching qualification). She lectures on Paris and France worldwide and contributes to various publications, television and radio and has spoken on radio in the UK , US and France. She is the author of the Around and About Paris series, Romantic Paris, and Aveyron, A Bridge to French Arcadia

BA Hons Courtauld Freelance Lecturer in Fine Arts and Tour Guide to: Berlin/Dresden/Munich/Côte d’Azur/Normandy/New York

Barry is a historian of British Art with a particular interest in the work of J M W Turner, on whom he has published widely, including the volume on Turner in Phaidon’s Art & Ideas series. He was the BBC’s script consultant and expert commentator for Rolf Harris’s programme on the Fighting Temeraire and contributed to the making of a BBC2 documentary called The Genius of Turner: Painting the Industrial Revolution. He has also published a study of John Constable’s paintings. His interests and his teaching extend to modern and contemporary art in all its forms. He is currently Associate Lecturer with the Open University and lecturing on a freelance basis for Nadfas, Christie’s Education and other organisations. Reading List New Yorker Book of Art Cartoons (New Yorker, 2005). Matthew Collings This is Modern Art (Seven Dials, 2000) Robert Hughes The Shock of the New (Thames & Hudson 1991) Julian Stallabrass Contemporary Art – A Very Short Introduction (OUP 2006)

After obtaining a degree in Textile Design from Leeds University, Jacqueline received textile conservation training through the North of England Museums service. In 1982, she established a freelance conservation studio, offering textile conservation services to both private and public sectors. Jacqueline is an Accredited Textile Conservator/Restorer (ACR) member of the Institute for Conservation and a member of the panel of Conservators for The Heritage Council for Ireland.

Mary Yule is the former Assistant Director and the Director of Grants at the Art Funds. She is also an experienced lecturer for the Art Fund, Kingston University, the National Gallery, the Wallace Collection and NADFAS

Mr. Everett is Librarian Emeritus of the Royal Library, Windsor Castle. He was Librarian there and Assistant Keeper of the Royal Archives from 1985 to 2002. During those 17 years working with the Royal Collection at Windsor Castle, he gained a deep and detailed knowledge of the Collection and of the history of the Castle and its occupants.

Mark Corby is a member of the Institute of Classical Studies and the Royal Archaeological Institute. He has been a freelance historian for the last five years and lectures for the National Association for Design & Fine Art Societies as well as the Institute of Archaeology. He has been a guest lecturer and historical guide on several foreign adventures. He is also a researcher and presenter of TV historical documentaries.

Eric is a regular face on TV. He is currently working on Series 4 of BBC 2’s most watched ‘Put your Money where your Mouth is’ and has recently completed the second series of ‘Antique Master’ hosted by Sandi Toksvig. Eric has appeared on 'The Twentieth Century Roadshow', 'Crimewatch UK' (for all the right reasons), 'Selling the Family Silver', 'Going For A Song', 'The Great Antiques Hunt', 'The Antique Inspectors', 'It’s a Gift' and 'You Can’t Take It with You', and as resident antiques expert on 'This Morning'. Eric is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and has lectured extensively in the UK at such renowned museums as the Victoria and Albert and the British Museum and he has also lectured in both the USA and Canada.

Charles Harris has had a life-long career in advertising around the world, most of it as a Creative Director in global agencies (J Walter Thompson, Bates, FCB, Publicis, Leo Burnett) responsible for the quality of the creative ideas and finished production of advertising campaigns for many of the world’s great brands including British Airways, QANTAS, Sony, Nestle, Kraft, BP, Ford, Black & Decker, Amex, Heinz, Gillette, General Motors and McDonalds. It is his experience as a creator of posters that makes his presentation and observations about poster art so different. He is not an academic although he brings a substantial knowledge of art history to his lectures, It is his inside knowledge and internationally respected creative opinion that makes his performances so compelling. Find out more about his work on his personal website http://postersight.co.uk/#

Roger Mitchell studied History at Oxford and Fine Art at Leeds. Awarded Churchill Fellowship to travel and study in USA. Former College Vice-Principal who now lectures for University of Liverpool and for Adult Residential Colleges. Organises and leads country house study tours and tries to find time for research at Chatsworth.

Anne is a lecturer at the Victoria and Albert Museum. She is a guide for private tours of the State Rooms and The Queen's Gallery at Buckingham Palace and lectures on British Painting to American students resident in London. In Autumn 2002, she catalogued the collection of Chinese porcelain at Kensington Palace and from then until 2005, she was a committee member of the French Porcelain Society. From 1995-2002, she was resident in Shanghai, China, and visited ancient kiln sites and lectured to expatriate groups. From 1981-1995, she trained and became a senior ceramics specialist at Christie's and Bonham's head offices