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 Sabanci 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.

Topkapi Palace in Istanbul stands as the definitive, stone-carved manifestation of Ottoman state philosophy, serving as the primary imperial residence and administrative nerve center for nearly 400 years (from the 1460s to 1853).

Commissioned by Sultan Mehmed II after the 1453 conquest of Constantinople, the complex was designed not as a single massive building, but as a series of four courtyards and functional, interconnected structures that reflected the power, privacy, and religious authority of the Ottoman Sultans.

Jacqui Ansell gained her Art History degree from Essex University before specialising in History of Dress at the Courtauld Institute and establishing a career as writer and tutor for the Open University and lecturer at the National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery and Christie's Education.

Art and fashion in the age of Samuel Pepys (1633–1703) were defined by the opulence, Restoration-era extravagance, and heavy French influence that followed the return of Charles II in 1660.  As a meticulous diarist and son of a tailor, Pepys’s personal record provides an intimate look into this period, documenting his own obsession with status-signaling, high-end clothing and the vibrant, often anxious, culture of 1660s London

In addition to working as an exploration geologist in South Africa and a gold miner in California, our lecturer, Jeremy Mainwaring-Burton, spent several years as a jewellery and precious stone dealer in London’s Hatton Garden. When the Queen Mother died in 2002 he helped open the Castle of Mey to the public and what was supposed to be a six-week appointment turned into six years. As a result hespent more time at the Castle of Mey than its royal owner ever did, and developed it as one of northern Scotland’s most popular tourist attractions.

Having had access to the jewels designated Heirlooms of the Crown and with a spectacular collection of her own, the Queen Mother had so much jewellery to choose from over the course of her long life that it would be almost impossible to describe it all. This lecture will chronicle her passion for jewels by concentrating on a selection of items which are of particular gemmological and historic interest …. and have an intriguing story attached.

Ian is a native Londoner and has spent more years than he cares to remember working in and around London. He is a guide, a cruise speaker and a lecturer with a special interest in art and architecture. His enthusiasm can be rather contagious. He just loves showing people around, and giving lectures about subjects which excite him. He sees his role as bringing things to life, and revealing secrets in an entertaining way. His hope is that everyone will learn something new in all of his lectures and tours. He is an accredited lecturer for The Arts Society, a fully qualified City of London tour guide, a City of Westminster guide and a green badge holder from the Institute of Tourist Guiding. He is an official guide at Tate Modern and Tate Britain, St Paul’s Cathedral and the Guildhall Art Gallery. He is also a Freeman of the Worshipful Company of Art Scholars.

British talent has always been at the forefront, and we have much to celebrate. In this talk, Ian tours around the UK and overseas, showcasing the brilliance of some of the designers who have made huge improvements to the built environment and enhanced the lives of those around them.

Famous names like Lutyens, Gilbert Scott, Foster, Hadid and Rogers are joined by several lesser known but equally creative architects. 

Carole is an experienced guide and lecturer on combined history and art tours in France with 20 years experience. Having lived and worked on a number of bespoke river vessels and converted barges there she has used them as a platform from which to research her lectures. She uses art in all its guises to explore the characters who shaped France and likes to delve behind the scenes to discover hidden truths.

In December 2024, Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris reopened after a devastating fire had threatened to destroy it 5 year earlier. There had never been any doubt as to whether to restore or not; such is the power of this building in the psyche of the French people. In this lecture Carole explores the cultural significance of Notre Dame through the ages and what makes it so special.

Between the world wars a group of British artists explored the downland of southern England, finding in the ancient landscapes of Sussex and Wessex inspiration for new work. Eric Ravilious and fellow artists Peggy Angus and Tirzah Garwood, William Nicholson, and John and Paul Nash led the way. These artists created paintings and prints that were defiantly modern, yet rooted in the past.

Roger Medham is a keen and accomplished photographer; he has has gained Distinctions from the Royal Photographic Society and is currently the President of the Surrey Photographic Association. 

His artistic taste is predominantly 20th century, and he is particularly interested in the visual aspects of art. His photography concentrates on shapes, textures and colours and he has studied the history of photography from its earliest developments in the early 1830s to becoming a major art form in the late 20th and now 21st centuries.

An experienced public speaker, his talks are all richly illustrated.

Monopoly is one of the world’s most popular and enduring board games, but how well do you really know it?
Take a photographic journey around the Monopoly boards and expect some surprises.

Chris Aslan spent his childhood in Turkey and Lebanon, and much of his adult life in Central Asia. He is a writer, a lecturer on art and textiles, and a leader of tours to Central Asia.

The Silk Road conjures images of the exotic and the unknown. Most travellers simply pass along it. Brit Chris Alexander chose to live there. Ostensibly writing a guidebook, Alexander found life at the heart of the glittering madrassahs, mosques and minarets of the walled city of Khiva - a remote desert oasis in Uzbekistan - immensely alluring, and stayed. Immersing himself in the language and rich cultural traditions Alexander discovers a world torn between Marx and Mohammed - a place where veils and vodka, pork and polygamy freely mingle - against a backdrop of forgotten carpet designs, crumbling but magnificent Islamic architecture and scenes drawn straight from "The Arabian Nights". Accompanied by a large green parrot, a ginger cat and his adoptive Uzbek family, Alexander recounts his efforts to rediscover the lost art of traditional weaving and dyeing, and the process establishing a self-sufficient carpet workshop, employing local women and disabled people to train as apprentices. "A Carpet Ride to Khiva" sees Alexander holed up in the British Museum discovering carpet designs dormant for half a millennia, tackling a carpet-thieving mayor, distinguishing natural dyes from sacks of opium in Northern Afghanistan and seeking sanctuary as an anti-Western riot consumed the Kabul carpet bazaar. It is an unforgettable, true travel story of a journey to the heart of the unknown and the unexpected friendship one man found there.

Mankind has exploited the medicinal properties of plants for thousands of years, yet the role of plants in modern medicine is still considered to be peripheral by many people. This talk attempts to put the record straight and to show that plant products are used every day by all of us to relieve pain and suffering, to heal wounds and cure diseases. This is a talk with a very wide appeal and relevance.

A follow up to the earlier talk, looking at the influence the style had in different countries, including Britain, Austria, Spain, Latvia and America. Despite the fact that Art Nouveau was originally largely inspired by British designers, the style found little favour in this country. While French and Belgian architects used plant forms to create organic three dimensional forms, Austrian Art Nouveau is surprisingly flat, and in Barcelona Antoni Gaudi’s buildings seem much more based on animal shapes than plants.

The hilltop Tuscan town of Siena, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, was arguably the most important centre of artistic patronage and craftsmanship during the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, where the foundations were laid for the 15th century Renaissance. With the intention of creating the most beautiful of city republics, the Sienese government spent lavishly, fostering the talent of native artists such as Duccio di Buoninsegna, Simone Martini and Ambrogio and Pietro Lorenzetti, as well as enticing other Tuscan craftsmen such as Giovanni Pisano to work in Siena.

The art of beating gold leaf and gilding dates back to ancient Egypt.  Traditionally craftsmen pounded gold for hours to create sheets thin enough to cover the most finely detailed surfaces.  For over 22 centuries from Tutankhamun’s sarcophagus to Rachel Whiteread’s gilded frieze for the Whitechapel Gallery, skilled artisans have exploited paper-thin metal leaf to enrich materials such as wood, metal, marble, leather, paper, glass, porcelain and textiles – even food and drink. 

Bandstands are a distinctive feature of public parks and seaside promenades all over Britain. But what do we actually know about them? Why did they appear in our earliest parks? When were they erected, and who made them?

Many of Britain’s best-loved country houses were created in the ‘Baroque’ period (c. 1660-1720). Visiting some of the most iconic houses of the period, including Chatsworth, Petworth, and Blenheim, we will meet the patrons who created them, and look at some of the highlights of their sumptuous interiors, gardens and collections, addressing the question: what is ‘Baroque’? 

The crowning of the sovereign is an ancient ceremony rich in religious significance, historical associations and pageantry. This lecture looks at the evolution of the coronation ceremony from Saxon times to the present day, examines the stages of the coronation from the Proclamation to the Homage and explains the significance of the various items of Coronation Regalia. Finally, the lecture gives an account of fascinating incidents, ill omens and memorable mishaps that have occurred at coronations and ends with a discussion of how the coronation of King Charles III differed from that of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in 1953.

Few gallery-goers are aware that Rubens was not only the most influential artist of his period, but also a high-ranking diplomat and informal spy. During his glamorous and prestigious career, Rubens travelled throughout Europe and was esteemed by the mightiest kings and queens of the age.

He was intelligent, good-looking and could speak several languages. His career as an artist was an excellent cover for international travel and private meetings. So, acting on behalf of the Governors of the Spanish Netherlands, Rubens had covert summits with Europe’s most significant power brokers like Marie de’Medici of France, King Philip IV of Spain, and King Charles I of England.

French 17th century chateau design owes much to one man; the ambitious visionary Nicolas Fouquet who is still something of an enigma today. He seemed invincible but made one grave error of judgement which was to lead to his downfall. He employed the country’s best talent of the day to commission a spectacular chateau for himself. In doing so he was completely outshining the Sun King. The story that ensues is legendary.

Ancient Peruvian burial grounds have yielded up dazzling goldwork, fine ceramic vessels, and some of the richest textiles in the world. Sumptuously woven garments, preserved for 2000 years by the Paracas desert, display a profusion of embroidered designs. For the Incas, who ruled the Andes of South America after AD 1200, the textile arts took precedence over other media. Chosen women devoted their lives to weaving for the Sun and the Inca State. Today, 500 years after the Spanish conquest, textiles remain central to Andean life.

As one of the great painters of the Victorian era, Atkinson Grimshaw created some of its most atmospheric paintings. In rain, mist, moonlight and gaslight, the River Thames, winding lanes and grimy docks all appear as if clothed in poetry and mystery. Discover the unique vision of the ‘master of moonlight’ – an artist who transformed the humdrum of everyday Victorian life into a magical ‘Grimshaw’.

Stuart will take us for a virtual stroll through the heart of Rome to discover some of the most iconic monuments of the Eternal City. Ancient Roman temples and other archaeological remains rub shoulders with baroque churches. Splendid fountains adorn magnificent piazzas, and the 20th century monumentalism of united Italy adds a modern touch to this beautiful city. Highlights of this lecture include in-depth looks at the Trevi Fountain, Pantheon, Spanish Steps and Piazza Navona, with much more to see along the way.  

This lecture will be presented on Zoom from Suffolk

Andrew was commissioned to make many jewels for the main characters in Downton Abbey and this inspired him to create a talk based on this unique period. Jewellery and  fashion are often seen as two entirely separate fields of design, but this is far from the case. Andrew will guide you through the extraordinary decades and events between 1890 and 1929, where the great couturiers and jewellers collaborated to produce clothes and jewels of outstanding opulence and quality.

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. 

A look at the astonishing flowering of this highly decorative style that flourished briefly around 1900.  Art Nouveau arose, initially in Belgium and France, as a reaction against Victorian historicism and the so-called “battle of the styles”.  It was the emergence in the 19th century of iron as a building material that allowed for the creation of new forms of architecture.  In a search for these new forms, architects such as Victor Horta and Hector Guimard turned to nature for their inspiration, having been influenced by Britain’s Arts and Crafts movement and the ideas of William Morris.

Peter Medhurst appears in the UK and abroad as 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.

The Dutch paintings of the 17th century which show musical scenes are among the most evocative and best loved of the period. However, the presence of music in the pictures of Vermeer and his contemporaries goes far beyond mere representation and appears to carry hidden and complex meanings that the viewer must attempt to decode in order to get to the heart of the picture. Peter Medhurst discusses in great details Vermeer’s musical scenes and performs a selection of period songs and keyboard music to complement the pictures.

The origins of Britain’s Spas go back to pre-Roman times when they developed from mineral springs or holy wells associated with local myths. During the 16C the Tudors started taking the waters as standard medical practise. Then in the 18C the Spa towns were transformed into fashionable watering places for Georgian society, who gathered there to dance, gamble, gossip and flirt as well as to take the waters. Splendid architecture, extensive parks and colourful gardens were created to attract the Beau Monde to these beautiful towns. Twelve of these exist today amongst the most famous being Bath, Cheltenham, Harrogate, Buxton and Malvern.

Nicola Moorby is an independent art historian specialising in British art of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. She studied at the University of York and Birkbeck College, London.

During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Italy was the country of every artist’s dreams. This lecture recreates a visual tour of Italy in the company of J.M.W. Turner. By studying rarely seen drawings from his travel sketchbooks we will take a privileged look into the world of the artist, following in his footsteps through Venice, Rome, Tivoli and Naples. Through his most intimate and private sketches we will recapture the excitement and dangers of nineteenth-century tourism, and the British love of Italian culture and history. In addition to on-the-spot sketches documenting where he went and what he saw, we will examine Turner’s artistic response to his Italian experiences, tracing the evolution of his ideas from preparatory studies to finished watercolours and oils.  

Following a degree in Classics from Oxford University, our lecturer taught Classics at secondary school level since 1998, and currently teaches at Godolphin and Latymer in London; here he runs the school’s Ancient World Breakfast Club, which has an ethos similar to that of The Arts Society. 

Since 1998, he has published a number of textbooks related to the classical world, including In Search of the Greeks and In Search of the Romans. In addition to his school teaching, he hase also lectured for the V&A Academy, most recently on their Classical World and its Afterlife and Classicism from the Ancients to the Renaissance courses. He is a keen traveller, and is lucky enough to have taken many photos of ancient sites, a number of which have been used in his books.

Every four years, the advent of the newest iteration of the Olympic games brings scrutiny and reflection on their ancient forebears. The ancient Olympics lasted for over 1000 years and were both very similar and very different to the modern games. They were held in honour of the great god Zeus at his sanctuary at Olympia in the Greek Peloponnese. The art and architecture of this sanctuary was emblematic of the ancient Olympic spirit - and represents some of the finest sculpted art to survive from ancient Greece.

Our lecturer, Stephen Duffy, was educated at New College, Oxford. Formerly, he was Senior Curator of the Wallace Collection where he had particular responsibility for exhibitions and nineteenth-century paintings. He has given countless tours of the Collection for visiting groups and many lectures on its art and other related subjects. His latest publication, The Discovery of Paris, is a book on early nineteenth-century watercolour views of Paris by major British artists.

Illustrated with many wonderful works of art, this lecture tells the extraordinary story of the rise of the son of a lawyer in Ajaccio, Corsica, to become Emperor of the French before finally being defeated and sent into exile on the island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic. It also attempts to explain the nature of his genius as an administrator and a military commander, assessing his achievements and his failures, his strengths and his weaknesses.

Tessa Boase grew up in the Ashdown Forest, Sussex; studied English at Oxford and Italian in Florence; and has worked for a variety of magazines and national newspapers including The Daily Telegraph.
As a freelance journalist she's written widely on society, the environment, the food chain, and the link between all three. As a narrative non-fiction author, her interests lie in uncovering stories of invisible women, from the 19th and early 20th-centuries.
She's married with children, and lives between the Sussex coast and a farmhouse in the Sabine Hills, Italy, where she produces olive oil.

Not long ago every major high street in Greater London, from Ilford to Uxbridge, had its landmark department store, while the West End was full of them, from Debenham & Freebody on Wigmore Street to Swan and Edgar at Piccadilly Circus. But now, with only Selfridges and John Lewis left even on Oxford Street, department stores are suddenly an endangered species. They were more than architectural wonders, though the fabulous Art Deco of Derry & Toms with its Moorish roof garden and the Moderne lines of Holdrons of Peckham Rye were certainly that: department stores led the way in fashion and design and, as safe destinations for the independent woman, in social progress. They became legendary for their exotic pet departments, their publicity stunts, their Christmas decorations, their furs: as places where you could buy anything.  

In her lecture Tessa Boase will take you back to that vanished era of confidence and style, celebrating such fabulous, much mourned emporia as the vast Whiteleys in Queensway with its sweeping staircase, Gamages of Holborn and its peerless toy department, and Grants of Croydon that kitted out the RAF.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, February 19th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

To register for Zoom or for further information please contact Debbie Jones tasbtours@gmail.com

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Our lecturer, Alexandra Epps, is an accredited Lecturer for The Arts Society and Guide and Lecturer at Tate Modern, Tate Britain and the Guildhall Art Gallery. She is also an official Guide to the City of London, offering walks and talks about many aspects of the arts, including stained glass, for societies, corporations and private individuals. Her background is in design having practised as a graphic designer running her own design consultancy for many years. Member of the City of London Guide Lecturers Association and Freeman of the City of London.

John Singer Sargent; (January 12, 1856 – April 14, 1925) was an American expatriot artist, considered the "leading portraitt painter of his generation" for his evocations of Edwardian-era luxury. He created roughly 900 oil paintings and more than 2,000 watercolors, as well as countless sketches and charcoal drawings. His oeuvre documents worldwide travel, from Venice to the Tyrol, Corfu,Spain, the Middle East, Montana, Maine, and Florida.

From the scandal of the painting of Madame X to the trials, tribulations and triumph of Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose, discover the rise, the fall and rise again of John Singer Sargent, the leading portrait painter of his age - the age of elegance. Discover an artist who devoted his entire life to the creation of beauty.

Nigel Bates has been a performer for more than forty years in and out of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, including seventeen years as Principal Percussionist with the Orchestra and eight years as the Music Administrator of The Royal Ballet He has worked with many of the leading figures in the classical music industry and was also a producer for both the BBC's Maestro at the Opera and Pappano's Classical Voices documentary series. He is a regular contributor to the printed and online content of the ROH.

He has given lectures for over thirty years, including many arts societies and conservatoires in the UK and across Australia.

The Nutcracker ballet has delighted audiences at Christmas for many decades, yet it was deemed a failure at its initial performances. Based upon the Royal Ballet production by Sir Peter Wright, this lecture takes a close look at how this well-loved ballet now takes its rightful place on stage and how the music of Tchaikovsky along with story-telling, design, dance and a little bit of stage ingenuity all come together to make the most magical escape for young and old alike. The talk will be fully illustrated with audio and performance video clips.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, November 20th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

To register for Zoom or for further information please contact Debbie Jones tasbtours@gmail.com

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

We're delighted to welcome Barry back to Betchworth having last seen him in July when he entertained us with his wonderful lecture on Giles.

Modern Art is often considered difficulkt, but it is much less so when seen through the eyes of the greates cartoonists of the last one hundred and fifty years, who provide a humopurous and scep[tical but instructive duide to modern art from Courbet to to the Britart of the 1990s..

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Imogen Corrigan, BA, MPhil, FRSA, spent nearly 20 years in the British Army and retired in the rank of Major before turning to a life-long interest in Anglo-Saxon and Medieval History, which she studied at the University of Kent. A proficient lecturer on medieval history and particularly church art and architecture, and accredited with the Arts Society, Imogen has also gained an MPhil from the University of Birmingham. Her book Stone on Stone: The Men Who Built the Cathedrals was published in 2019. In 2022 Imogen was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

You don’t have to go into many churches right across Europe, or look at many manuscripts made at any time during the Middle Ages to notice fabulous monsters, mythical beasts and grotesques rampaging through the carvings and pages. Some are funny, some downright disrespectful, but all show a strange mixing of devotion with deformity, piety with profanity, reverence with roguishness.

Were our ancestors bonkers or did these images have a purpose? What inspired them? Did they come from travellers’ tales or were they made to make moral points? This lecture explores these questions and more. If nothing else, the medieval monsters are fun. Some are terrifying, but many others are utterly adorable.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, September 18th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

To register for Zoom or for further information please contact Debbie Jones tasbtours@gmail.com

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

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. 

The cartoonist, Carl Giles, once said that he loved his creation, Grandma Giles – that fearsome, black-clad, gambling, drinking battleaxe – because she allowed him to say things through his cartoons that he was too polite to say in person. She helped him to poke fun at authority in all its forms, from Hitler to traffic wardens and even his employers at the Daily Express, who didn’t trust him and had sub-editors scouring his cartoons for subversive background details. His admirers included Prince Charles, Sir Malcolm Sargent and Tommy Cooper, and it was no surprise when he was voted Britain’s best-loved cartoonist in 2000. Few people realise, however, that this likeable and humane satirist was also a war correspondent who witnessed the horrors of Belsen, where he found that the camp commandant, Josef Kramer, was also a great fan of his work. Giles gave us a remarkable picture of a half-century of British life. He was also, as his editor John Gordon put it “a spreader of happiness’ and ‘a genius…with the common touch’.

Join us in Betchworth, on Monday, July 17th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5.

Please note; this lecture will not be ZOOMed.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Chloe Sayer is a freelance author, lecturer, photographer and curator, specialising in the art and culture of Mexico. In 1978 her Churchill Fellowship took her to Mexico and Guatemala to research The Continuity of Maya Tradition. She has since published several books. These include Arts and Crafts of Mexico (1990), Textiles from Mexico (2002) and Mexico: Clothing and Culture (2015). She has also made ethnographic collections for the British Museum in Mexico and Belize. In 2015 she co-curated an exhibition of Mexican textiles at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto and she is a research associate in the Department of World Cultures.

With its mosaic of cultures, Mexico has long been a magnet for British travellers.  In the nineteenth century, the ‘lost’ rainforest cities of the Maya were revealed by artist Frederick Catherwood and archaeologist Alfred Percival Maudslay.  Eminent twentieth-century literary visitors included D. H. Lawrence and Graham Greene.  Mexico holds an especial fascination for Surrealists.  Edward James created a vast sculpture garden with towering concrete forms, in a subtropical rainforest.

After a spell in an asylum, painter Leonora Carrington found the freedom she needed in Mexico.

In our own century, the photographs of Martin Parr focus on street culture, while the fashion designs of Zandra Rhodes echo the vibrant colours and patterns of modern Mexico.  This will be a fascinating lecture.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, June 19th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Steve Kershaw has taught for the University of Oxford's Department of Continuing Education since 1998. He has been fascinated by the culture of the Greek Bronze Age ever since he first ...

A casual glance down any modern high street will probably provide a reminder of the influence which ancient Greek architecture, and Greek temple architecture in particular, still has. This talk aims to allow the audience quickly to become familiar with the intrinsic qualities of Greek temples. Firstly, by ‘building’ a generic Greek temple we will look at the plan, elevation, ‘orders’, painting, materials, construction methods, functions, and challenges of decoration that these structure pose. Then, through a selection of some of the finest works of world architecture and sculpture, we will see how the ancient Greeks rose to those challenges.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, May 15th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Joanna Mabbutt is a Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers and Freeman of the City of London. Originally a trained singer, pianist and orchestra administrator, Jo is now a decorative artist who gilds antique lace and crochet, often combining with hand printing and painting.  She works to commission, sells through galleries and exhibitions and collaborates with other designers. 

London’s grandest thoroughfare for centuries, the Thames has hosted royal weddings and state funerals, fireworks and pyrotechnics, music and masques, coronations and Lord Mayors’ pageants, processions and civic festivities. 

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, April 17th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Angela Findlay is an Anglo-German artist, author and public speaker with a former career of teaching art in prisons both in England and Germany.

Running through her own artistic practice is a deep interest in everyday moments of beauty and the layered traces of time passing.

The empty chair has been used greatly within art from Van Gogh's Chair to Joseph Kosuth's One and Three Chairs and more recently in Ai Weiwei's Fairytale. It portrays the absence of the subject but also the presence of the object while enhancing and reinforcing the emptiness and abandonment within this space.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, March 20th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Susan Whitfield is a historian of medieval Central Asia and a former curator at The British Library. Her research focuses on the archaeology, art history and material culture of the Silk Road. The author of many books and articles, she has travelled extensively in Central Asia and visited, studied and documented numerous archaeological sites.

Our lecture will describe how silk farming was established throughout much of continental Europe by the 14th century. With the British elite following the continental fashion for expensive silk clothing, James 1st, in the 17th century, set about establishing sericulture in England. In 1611 the first harvest of raw silk was produced. But the venture did not thrive. This lecture will tell the story of this failed industry, of the later — and successful — weaving industry, facilitated by the theft of industrial secrets from Italy and by skilled Huguenot refugees seeking sanctuary in Britain. It will finish with a more recent successful sericulture venture which supplied silk for royal dresses through much of the twentieth century.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, or come as a visitor for £5. Just pay at the door.

For further information, email Christine Smart:  christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Alexandra Epps is an official Guide and Lecturer at Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Guildhall Art Gallery and Pallant House Gallery. She is an Art History Tutor at City Lit Institute and a qualified Guide to the City of London, offering lectures and walks about many aspects of the arts for societies, corporations and private individuals. She is a member of the City of London Guide Lecturers Association, and 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.

Our lecture will explore the extraordinary story of the rebuilding of Coventry Cathedral as a symbol of peace and reconciliation and its inspiring commitment to the modern. Through the images, we shall experience the work of many of the world-class artists associated with its treasures, including Epstein, Frink, Piper and Sutherland.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, or come as a visitor for £5. Just pay at the door. If you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor either to the hall or by Zoom. Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

For further information, email Christine Smart:  christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Doors open for light refreshments at 7.00 pm 

Lecture starts at 7.30 pm 

Betchworth Village Memorial Hall

'A Tour of St Peter’s Basilica’ 

Stuart will take us on a virtual journey through 2000 years of Christianity, as we explore the art & history of the spectacular Basilica in the Vatican. The original, built by Constantine, was rebuilt in the 16th century to designs by Michelangelo and decorated by Bernini who also designed the sweeping colonnades of St. Peter’s Square.

Christmas Lecture & Get-Together presented live from Rome on Zoom

Tickets £15 each to include light refreshments

Open to Members, Friends, and Visitors

Retiring Collection for 'Crisis at Christmas'

To purchase tickets or for more information phone 01737 845514, 01737 841597 or email Tasbtours@gmail.com

Clare Phillips (M.A. Royal College of Art, London) has been a curator at the Victoria and Albert Museum since 1989. As a jewellery historian she is part of the small team dedicated to the V&A’s jewellery collection and is the author of the V&A’s classic book ‘Jewels & Jewellery’.

In this lecture, Clare examines the exquisite jewellery, vivid enamelled boxes, intricate hard-stone figures and naturalistic flower studies of the Russian Jeweller Carl Faberge. Christmas was the firm’s busiest time, rather than Easter! The talk will focus on the London Branch, and we will escape into the most privileged realms of Edwardian Christmas Shopping.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, November 21st at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Jo Banham, former head of adult learning at The Victoria & Albert Museum and now a freelance curator, lecturer and writer, will be presenting this lecture.

Wallpaper is often regarded as the Cinderella of the Decorative Arts – the most ephemeral and least precious of the decorations produced for the home. Yet, the history of wallpaper is a long and fascinating subject. It dates back to the 16th century and encompasses a huge range of beautiful patterns created both by anonymous hands and by some of the best-known designers of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, October 17th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Note date has changed to Tuesday 20th September 2022

Our lecturer James Taylor studied at the Universities of St Andrews and Manchester, and is a former curator of paintings, drawings and prints, at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich. He is also a lecturer and ships' historian on board cruise ships. His lectures are always enthusiastically received by our members.

In 1831 Charles Darwin and Captain Robert FitzRoy, the commander of HMS Beagle, embarked on their celebrated voyage which enabled Darwin to collect vital evidence for his ground-breaking publication ‘On the Origin of Species’.

FitzRoy paid for two artists, Augustus Earle and Conrad Martens, to paint the people and places encountered, and these images underpin the series of sensational seafaring stories.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Tuesday, September 20th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

The merchants of seventeenth century Holland filled their town houses with paintings. A favourite subject was scenes of everyday life: depicting behaviour both good … and bad. But these upright Calvinist citizens rejected Catholic Baroque melodrama. They wanted nothing to alarm the in-laws or corrupt the children. Innocent objects hint at adult themes: plucked chickens and lap dogs, lutes and virginals, oysters and artichokes, foot warmers and bed warmers. This is a world of subtle hints and double-entendre, spoken through a language of symbols, emblems and motifs.

Our lecturer, Lynne Gibson is now working as a freelance lecturer in the History of Art.   She originally trained as a fine artist and has taught painting, drawing and printmaking in higher and adult education. She lectured as an art historian for the universities of Sussex and Bristol where she introduced 'Understanding Art' to the Lifelong Learning programme and residential summer schools. She gives talks, lectures and guided tours to a wide range of organisations and institutions including ARCA colleges, the National Trust, National Gallery, art museums and art societies. She has worked as a professional artist specializing in oil painting and etching.

Join us in Betchworth on Monday, July 18th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 .   

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Dr Smith has a PhD from the Warburg Institute, London University. She is an author and lecturer, a leader of cultural tours on the continent and lecturer for several cruise lines.She has contributed to television programmes, most recently an episode of  ‘Digging up Britain’s Past’.

In this lecture, Dr Angela Smith will explore aspectsof the brilliant Islamic visual culture produced in Spain. Starting with the Umayyad rule in Cordoba -including the building of the Mezquita - the Great Mosque and the palace city of Madinat al Zahra: she then traces the subsequent history of Muslim culture in Spain, examining Hispano-Islamic
ceramics, ivories and other artistic forms. She concludes with the Reconquista including the building of the Alhambra in Granada.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, June 20th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Paul Rabbitts graduated at Sheffield with a BA Honours in Geography followed by a Masters Degree in Landscape Architecture at Edinburgh. He is a qualified landscape architect and celebrated park manager and has worked for several local authorities across the UK, currently Head of Parks, Heritage and Culture at Watford.

This really is a fascinating insight into the history of one of our greatest ever institutions - our Great British Public Park. We have all enjoyed them at some time in our lives but what do we really know about them? What are their origins? This talk illustrates their origins from the great Royal Parks to the Pleasure Gardens of the eighteenth century, to their Victorian heyday. It discusses what makes a great park, it’s ‘parkitecture’ with examples of lodges, lakes, bandstands, fountains, lidos, palm houses and to their wonderful floral displays, to their great decline in the sixties, seventies and eighties. However, the subsequent revival has led to a major shift in interest in our parks and once again we are very much in love with them. This is a highly illustrative lecture accompanied by slides with examples of parks from across the UK.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, May 16th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture. It is free for members but if you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5 either to the hall or by Zoom.   Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Our lecturer Julian Richards studied archaeology at Reading University and has since worked as a professional archaeologist. His career in broadcasting involved researching and presenting ‘Meet the Ancestors’ and ‘Blood of the Vikings’ for BBC2,and ‘Mapping the Town’ for Radio 4. Guest curator of ‘Wish you were here’, an exhibition of his own extensive collection of 'Stonehengiana' is currently on display at the new Stonehenge Visitor Centre

WIliam Morris led a revolution against the products of the machine age. The first of our ‘passionate potters’, William de Morgan, was a friend of Morris who rediscovered the secrets of Near Eastern lustre glazes. In contrast, the eccentric Martin Brothers created a range of elaborate salt glazed pots unparalleled in their imaginative breadth. Sir Edmund Elton, the ‘potter baronet’, made pots which combine startling glazes with exotic forms. And finally, Bernard Leach, the father of English studio pottery, not only married the arts of Japan and England but created a legacy that is still alive today.

Join us in Betchworth, or by zoom from your home, on Monday, April 25th at 2.30 pm for this stimulating, illustrated lecture.   If you are not a member (we are recruiting new members now) do come as a visitor for £5.00 either to the hall or by Zoom. Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

  email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

Our lecturer Elizabeth Gowing studied at Magdalen College Oxford before training as a teacher. She moved to Kosovo in 2006 and worked with the Ethnological Museum in Prishtina and co-founded ‘The Ideas Partnership’, a charity working on education and cultural
heritage projects. She speaks fluent Albanian and has very recently been appointed to his Cabinet by the Prime Minister of Kosovo as an Advisor on Community Affairs.

Edith Durham's travels in the first decades of the twentieth century took her across the unexplored Accursed Mountains between Kosovo,Montenegro and Albania, to what are now UNESCO World Heritage Site
monasteries, and through bazaars which she described as ‘glowing with goods’. She recorded in watercolours, and in seven published books, the objects she collected, the landscapes she visited and the people she met. This lively lecture, illustrated with rich fabrics and great stories draws on our lecturer Elizabeth Gowing’s book, ‘Edith and I; On the trail of an Edwardian traveller in Kosovo’ (2013). It was described by The Times as 'the most
delicious and delightful read of the summer’"

If you are not a member do come as a visitor. Zooming is not complicated and we provide easy to follow instructions.

Join us by zoom from your home on Monday, March 21st at 2.30 pm for this

stimulating, illustrated virtual lecture. It is free for members but do come as a visitor for £5.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

All you need is a PC, laptop or tablet, a comfy chair and your favourite tipple!

For all our events or to become a member see our website

www.theartssocietybetchworth.org.uk

With a postgraduate degree in Fashion Curation from London College of Fashion, Arts Society lecturer Jacob Moss is the Curator of the Fan Museum in Greenwich, the UK’s only Museum dedicated to the history and craft of fans.

The Fan Museum occupies a pair of early Georgian townhouses nestled in historic Greenwich. Jacob Moss will tell us the story of how it came to fruition which is interwoven with the fascinating biography of its founder, whose personal collection forms the basis of the Museum’s holdings.

From an especially rare Elizabethan-period embroidered folding fan to contemporary examples decorated by street artists, discover with Jacob some of the key objects within the Museum’s collection of over 5,000 fans dating from the 10th century to the present day.

Join us by zoom from your home for this stimulating, illustrated virtual lecture. It is free for members but do come as a visitor for £5.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

All you need is a PC, laptop or tablet, a comfy chair and your favourite tipple!

Join professional Rome tourist guide Stuart Harvey for a journey upstream along the River Tiber as it winds through Rome from the Tiber Island to Ponte Milvio just north of the city centre. Starting with the legend of Romulus and Remus and the founding of Rome, and leading us through to the Unification of Italy and Rome’s new role as a modern capital city, the Tiber will lead us through 28 centuries of Roman history told by the historic bridges and riverside monuments. Roman Emperors, Renaissance Popes, Kings of Italy and some of the important and controversial political figures of the 19th and 20th centuries will feature along the way as we enjoy the beautiful views of "Er Biondo Tevere" ... "The Blond Tiber", as it is known in Rome.

Join us in the Hall or zoom from your home for this stimulating, illustrated virtual lecture. It is free for members but do come as a visitor for £5. Face masks are required in Betchworth Village Memorial Hall.

Email Christine Smart: christine.smart77@gmail.com or ring 01737 841597

All you need is a PC, laptop or tablet, a comfy chair and your favourite tipple!

Toby Faber is a non-executive director of Faber and Faber and Chairman of its sister company Faber Music, but he spends most of his time writing, with two books published to date - one on the violin-maker Antonio Stradivari, the other on the Imperial Easter Eggs made by Carl Fabergé.   He isa trustee of Yale Universitey Press (UK) and an executive director of the Copyright Licensing Agency.

Since its foundation in 1925, Faber and Faber has built a reputation as one of London’s most important literary publishing houses. Part of that relates to the editorial team that Geoffrey Faber and his successors built around them - TS Eliot was famously an early recruit - but a large part is also due to the firm’s insistence on good design and illustration. This lecture traces the history of Faber and Faber through its illustrations, covers and designs. Early years brought innovations like the Ariel Poems – single poems, beautifully illustrated, sold in their own envelopes. In the 1950s and 1960s, there was an emphasis on typography, led by the firm’s art director Berthold Wolpe; his Albertus font is still used on City of London road signs. In the 1980s, the firm started its association with Pentagram, responsible for the ff logo. Along the way, it has employed some of our most celebrated artists as cover illustrators – from Rex Whistler and Barnett Freedman to Peter Blake and Damien Hirst. Slides will range from book covers, advertisements and photos of key individuals, to illustrations of the concepts behind the designs. The talk will also be peppered with personal insight and anecdote. Faber and Faber is the last of the great publishing houses to remain independent. As the grandson of its founder, Toby grew up steeped in its books. He is passionate about the firm’s success, and intensely proud of his association with it.”

Bertie Price has a BA (Hons) in Drama from Manchester University, and a Diploma Internationale from the École Internationale du Théatre, and is a member of the Inner Magic Circle, with Gold Star.

Even though ‘work’ was the bedrock of Victorian progress and improvement, Queen Victoria’s reign saw the greatest upsurge in leisure pursuits ever witnessed. People earned more money and worked shorter hours than ever before and with the birth of the Railways and a desire to be health conscious it was a golden age for the art of entertaining oneself and being an amateur in the true sense of the word. Bertie’s talk celebrates a pre-television age when the ability to amuse and entertain was paramount. 

Our lecturer Timothy Walker was formerly Director of Oxford Botanical Gardens.

The Oxford Botanic Garden was founded at the begining of the 17th century and its design bears the hallmarks of 17th century design.   In the next 400 years successive HortiPraefecti (head gardeners) changed the features reflecting the art of gardening, and very occasionally the science of botany.   This talk looks at how the art of gardening has changed, or perhaps has not, in four centuries in Oxfordshire and how the Oxford Botanic Garden now refelcts garden design at the beginning of the 21st century.   The title of the talk refers to the fact that one of the motivations for garden design remains the desire to create Paradise on Earth.

Zara Fleming is an independent art consultant, lecturer and exhibition curator with specialist knowledge of Buddhist art; focusing on the art and culture of Tibet and the Himalayas.

This lecture explores the history, art and culture of this extraordinary country, which for centuries has preserved its traditional Buddhist values. It is known by its inhabitants as Druk Yul or land of the Thunder Dragon - a reference to the Drukpa tradition of Vajrayana Buddhism that permeates every aspect of Bhutanese life. Over the last few decades there have been many changes; such as the introduction of roads, television and tourism. Will Bhutan be able to maintain the fine balance between tradition and modernity without diminishing its unique culture?"

Daniel Robbins is Senior Curator, Museums with the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and is responsible for two of London’s most significant house museums: Leighton House Museum and 18 Stafford Terrace. He was responsible for leading the award-winning project to restore the historic interiors of the house completed between 2008 and 2010 and is now leading a £7 million refurbishment project addressing the additions made to the building in the twentieth century. 

Frederic Leighton’s studio-house (now Leighton House Museum) is one of the most remarkable buildings of the nineteenth-century. First built in the 1860s, Leighton continued to extend and embellish his home over the next thirty years, transforming what had been a relatively modest house into a palace of art. The construction of the exotic Arab Hall, lined with Islamic tiles collected as Leighton travelled through the Middle East brought new fame to the house.This lecture explores Leighton’s motivations in lavishing such attention on the construction of his home and how it came to embody the idea of how a Great Artist should live.

Janet Gough was for eight years the Church of England's Director of Church Buildings and Secretary of the Church Buildings Council  and Cathedrals' Fabric Commission.

Janet will take us on a fascinating, illustrated, virtual tour of the Church of England's 43 cathedrals, the jewels in the crown of our built heritage.

The lecture will give an overview of the history and architectural evolution of our cathedrals, and tell of some of their stories and treasures.

Shirley Smith graduated from the University of East Anglia with a first class honours degree in the History of Art, specialising in the Italian and Northern Renaissance. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a part-time lecturer for the University of East Anglia and for the Department of Continuing Education of the University of Cambridge.

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio was a man out of step with his time. Scorning the traditional idealised interpretation of religious subjects, he took his models from the streets, painting them realistically and heightening the emotional intensity by his dramatic contrasts of light and shade. Such a revolutionary style was condemned by many as was his equally dramatic personal life and uncontrollable temper which involved him in endless brawls and even murder. This lecture will study the life and works of this enigmatic man and of his influence on later artists.

Jennifer Toynbee-Holmes is an experienced guide at Tate Britain and Tate Modern and lectures at various art societies and institutions. She has a special interest in British and European art of the late 18th, 19th and early 20th century. Having gained an MA in film and television practice, Jennifer had a long-standing career spanning twenty years as a television producer/director making documentaries and factual programmes for the BBC, ITV and Channel 4. She was also a visiting lecturer at Goldsmiths College and Birkbeck, University of London and a senior lecturer at Southampton Solent University in the Faculty of Media, Arts and Society.

Since the birth of the earliest human civilisations, dance has been an important part of ceremony, rituals, celebrations, a method of healing and a means of expression and entertainment.

Using stills and video clips Jennifer will take a look at dance as an art form from its earliest beginnings; through the birth and rapid development of ballet throughout Europe, the explosion of modern dance in the early 20th century (a time of unprecedented creative growth for dancers and choreographers) and with the growth of post-modernism from the 1960s, the expression of street dance, hip-hop, break dancing and rock dance.

Sarah considers the materials and techniques used in oil sketches and exhibited works by Stanhope Forbes and his contemporaries in the light of technical examination undertaken during the recent cleaning and conservation. The lecture features details of notable and little seen works from private collections as well as more familiar works scrutinised in gallery collections both near and far. Ignoring the Fishing and the Folk that are often the preserve of discussions around the late 19th century Newlyn painting colony, from a technical perspective the surfaces of paintings by these artists pose as many questions as they answer. Many of the works are riddled with drying cracks that suggest complex paint layers, multiple changes of mind during the evolution of a composition and possibly the hasty use of incompatible or untested materials. However, very little technical examination or scientific analysis of Newlyn School works has been formally carried out in collections worldwide to try and address the questions that arise from such technical problems. Are they linked to the 19th century era of great change in artists’ materials, the rise and rise of the modern artists’ colourman, the invention of tube paints (with their pros and cons) and developments in pigment technology as a result of the industrial revolution? Are they simply the result of faulty technique? What can they tell us about the underlayers of a painting and the working up of a composition? In recent years, Sarah Cove has worked on and examined a number of these works. This lecture draws together recent discoveries about the working processes of this close artistic community. Sarah will reveal the secrets of the painters’ methods as viewed under the microscope, working solely from her own research and conservation records, and will ask as many questions as she answers. Problems with deterioration in the original materials will be discussed as well as comments on the cleaning, conservation and varnishing of these works. The lecture is illustrated with unique close-up macro-photos and the use of scientific methods such as x-radiography and infra-red reflectography.

Jane runs her own Arts Tours company and speaks several languages. She has an M.A. in Byzantine studies. Here is her synopsis of the lecture: “In the middle of the 11th century, at the time of the Norman Conquest, Palermo was one of the greatest commercial and cultural centres of the Muslim world. It was a busy metropolis with over 300 mosques, abuzz with markets, exchanges, craftsmen and artisans and all around were parks and pleasure gardens with fountains and running streams, so typical of the Muslim world. In 1072 Palermo fell to the Normans, taken by Roger I. During the 12th century Palermo became the most intellectually active and artistically eclectic centre in Europe. The great cathedrals of Cefalu, and Monreale, the Palatine Chapel of the Norman Palace, and the small church of Santa Maria Dell’Ammiraglio, were witness to a brilliant fusion of Norman, Arab and Byzantine art and architecture.”

Alex has lectured to us previously and also presented a very successful and enjoyable Study Day on Public Art in the City of London. She is a guide and lecturer at Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Guildhall Art Gallery and at Pallant House Gallery in Chichester. Alex has her own design consultancy and is a qualified Guide to the City of London. This is the synopsis of her January lecture about Peggy Guggenheim: “She was the 'poor little rich girl' who changed the face of twentieth century art. Not only was Peggy Guggenheim ahead of her time, but she was the woman who helped define it! She discovered and nurtured a new generation of artists, who were producing a new kind of art. Through collecting not only art, but the artists themselves, her life was as radical as her collection.

When Mozart was in London in 1765, the newspapers reported that, for two shillings and sixpence, the public could hear him play at the Swan and Hoop, Cornhill on a harpsichord and upon it a handkerchief, without seeing the keys!

He was just nine years old at the time.

Mozart's childhood was filled with tricks, adventure and experimentation and never before - or after - had there been a musical prodigy of such lasting genius and promise. 

The old adage travel broadens the mind was certainly the case with the boy and as he made his way around Europe with his family, performing in venues that ranged from taverns to palaces, his exposure to the musical centres of each country he visited set him up musically for the rest of his life. 

By delving into letters, newspaper advertisements and eye-witness accounts, our lecturer Peter Medhurst tells the story of Mozart up to the age of 10 years.  He will discuss and play a selection of works from these early years (including the very first piece to survive) to reveal one of the greatest real life musical dramas of all time.

Simon Seligman, formerly Head of Communications at Chatsworth, has lectured throughout the UK and in the US. He has also worked for John Ruskin’s charity the Guild of St George

John Ruskin (1819 – 1900) was a truly extraordinary and visionary Victorian. As writer, teacher, artist, collector, patron and critic, Ruskin was perhaps the most complete polymath of the 19th century. He left behind a dazzling range of writing and collections. His ideas inspired the Arts and Crafts Movement and the founding of the National Trust, the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, and the Labour Movement. He influenced the thinking of Tolstoy, Proust and Gandhi. He became deeply concerned by what he saw as the negative impacts of the industrialization of 19th century England. So he set up projects that aspired to give the working man access to beauty, art, craft and the land. In 1871, he founded what became the Guild of St George, the charity for arts, crafts and the rural economy. This lecture spans Ruskin’s life and work from the timeless and global to the intimate and exquisite, to paint a portrait of a great life.

Simon was the Dramaturg at the Welsh National Opera in Cardiff for 23 years.

Opera requires the work of composers, librettists, conductors, directors, designers, wardrobe, wig and prop technicians, as well as orchestra, chorus, soloists, stage crew, and an audience in front of which to perform. Simon Rees has been given access to the photographic collection of his former employers, Welsh National Opera, which illustrate every step of the production process. This lecture traces opera productions from costume designs and set models through to the making of costumes and sets, and rehearsals in the studio and auditorium.

Bertie is an Arts Society Accredited Lecturer who has toured the country extensively.

This is an in depth look at the profound mystery of perception. There is an eternal fascination with the unfathomable, the weird ambiguous state of seeing things which are not there –yet are there. It carries us back into that long gone deeply missed period of our childhood when magic was common place and when the boundary between the possible and the impossible was very blurred. In the same way as a magic trick surprises and delights us there is a primal enjoyment in being deceived by optical illusions. Since Roman times illusions have been used in art. The stretching and distorting of perspective has been highly developed by artists to create a range of effects on the viewer.

William Hogarth “Perspective Absurdities” Engraving 1754 

Cancelled

Lynne Gibson is an artist and former lecturer for the Universties of Sussex and Bristol.   She now lectures and guides tours for the National Trust and the National Gallery.

The merchants of seventeenth century Holland filled their town houses with paintings. A favourite subject was scenes of everyday life: depicting behaviour both good … and bad. But these upright Calvinist citizens rejected Catholic Baroque melodrama. They wanted nothing to alarm the in-laws or corrupt the children. Innocent objects hint at adult themes: plucked chickens and lap dogs, lutes and virginals, oysters and artichokes, foot warmers and bed warmers. This is a world of subtle hints and double-entendre, spoken through a language of symbols, emblems and motifs.

Cancelled

Dr Angela Smith is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.   She lectures part-time for the University of East Anglia and Dept of Continuing Education of the University opf Cambridge.

Córdoba, also spelled Cordova in English, is a city in Andalusia, southern Spain, and the capital of the province of Córdoba. It was a Roman settlement, taken over by the Visigoths, followed by the Umayyad Caliphate in the eighth century. It became the capital of a Muslim emirate, and then the Caliphate of Córdoba, which encompassed most of the Iberian peninsula. During this period, it became a center of education and learning, and by the 10th century had grown to be the largest city in Europe. It was conquered by the Kingdom of Castile in 1236.

Today, Córdoba is still home to many notable pieces of Moorish architecture such as The Mezquita, which was named as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1984 and is now a Cathedral. The UNESCO status has since been expanded to encompass the whole historic centrte of Córdoba. Much of this architecture, such as the Alcázar and the Roman Bridge has been reworked or reconstructed by the city's successive inhabitants.

Cancelled

Jo Banham was formerly the Head of Adult Learning at the V & A Museum.   She is an authority on Victorian and early 20th century decoration and interiors.

The main historical techniques are: hand-painting, wood block printing (overall the most common), stencilling, and various types of machine-printing. The first three all date back to before 1700.

Wallpaper, using the printmaking technique of woodcut, gained popularity in Renaissance Europe amongst the emerging gentry. The social elite continued to hang large tapestries on the walls of their homes, as they had in the Middle Ages. These tapestries added color to the room as well as providing an insulating layer between the stone walls and the room, thus retaining heat in the room. However, tapestries were extremely expensive and so only the very rich could afford them. Less well-off members of the elite, unable to buy tapestries due either to prices or wars preventing international trade, turned to wallpaper to brighten up their rooms.

Cancelled

Julian Richards is an archaeologist, lecturer, broadcaster for Radio 4 and author.

The first of our ‘passionate potters’, William de Morgan, was a friend of William Morris who rediscovered the secrets of Near Eastern luster glazes. In contrast, the eccentric and argumentative Martin Brothers created a range of elaborate salt glazed pots unparalleled in their imaginative breadth. Sir Edmund Elton, the ‘potter baronet’, made pots which combine startling glazes with exotic forms. And finally, Bernard Leach, the father of English studio pottery, not only married the arts of Japan and England but created a legacy that is still alive today. This lecture explores the lives of these truly passionate potters and celebrates their extraordinary and beautiful creations.

Elizabeth Gowring is co-founder of a charity working on education & cultural heritage projects in Kosovo.   She is an author and broadcaster on Radio 4 and BBC World Service.

From the early Kosovan silver mines which are mentioned in Dante, through the twentieth century politics over Kosovo’s mines which resulted in both a war and a golf course, a silver thread winds through Kosovo’s history.

Its most intricate tanglings are in the country’s cultural capital, Prizren, where a seventh generation of filigree artisans use ‘filum’ and ‘granum’, zigzags, ‘mouse-tooth’ designs and other twists and turns to magic lacy creations from dull sticks of raw material. The results – in boxes, buttons, jewellery, religious ornamentation and the talismans of superstition – are a fine narrative of Kosovo’s history and traditions.

Peter Medhurst is a musician and scholar, giving recitals and lectures on music and the arts. He studied at the Royal College of Music & at the Mozarteum in Salzburg.

Antonio Lucio Vivaldi  was an Italian Baroque musical composer, virtuoso violinist, teacher, and priest. Born in Venice, the capital of the Venetian Republic, he is regarded as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread across Europe. He composed many instrumental concertos, for the violin and a variety of other instruments, as well as sacred choral works and more than forty operas. His best-known work is a series of violin concertos known as the Four Seasons.

Dr Kate Aspinall is an independent historian, writer and artist.   She has degrees from the University of St. Andrews, the Courtauld Institute and the University of East Anglia.

Roy Fox Lichtenstein  was an American pop artist. During the 1960s, along withAndy Warhol, Jasper Johns, and James Rosenquist among others, he became a leading figure in the new art movement. His work defined the premise of pop art through parody. Inspired by the comic strip, Lichtenstein produced precise compositions that documented while they parodied, often in a tongue-in-cheek manner. His work was influenced by popular advertising and the comic book style. He described pop art as "not 'American' painting but actually industrial painting". His paintings were exhibited at the Leo Castelli Gallery in New York City.

Imogen Corrigen is an experience lecturer.   She is a graduate in Anglo-Saxon & Mediaeval History and Art.

The Bayeux Tapestry is an embroidered cloth nearly 230 ft long and 20 in tall, which depicts the events leading up to the Norman conquest of England concerning William, Duke of Normany, andHarold, Earl of Wessex, later King of England, and culminating in the Battle of Hastings. It is thought to date to the 11th century, within a few years after the battle. It tells the story from the point of view of the conquering Normans, but is now agreed to have been made in England.

  Sarah Lenton is a writer and broadcaster on Radios 3 & 4.She has directed more than 20 shows for Royal Opera house.

This lecture charts Opera’s close connection with the societies that have paid for it through the centuries.

Opera is a key part of theWestern classical music tradition. Originally understood as an entirely sung piece, in contrast to a play with songs, opera has come to include numerous genres, including some that include spoken dialogue such as musical theatre, Singspiel and Opera cómique. In traditional number opera, singers employ two styles of singing: recitative, a speech-inflected style, and self-contained arias. The 19th century saw the rise of the continuous music drama.

Sarah Cove is a lecturer, conservator & technical art historian. She is an authority on Constable, notably appearing on BBC's Fake or Fortune.

John Constable,RA, was an English landscape painter in the naturalistic tradition. Born in Suffolk, he is known principally for his landscape paintings of Dedham Vale, the area surrounding his home – now known as "Constable Country" – which he invested with an intensity of affection. "I should paint my own places best", he wrote to his friend John Fisher in 1821, "painting is but another word for feeling".

Constable's most famous paintings include Wivenhoe Park of 1816, Dedham Vale of 1802 and The Hay Wain of 1821.   Although his paintings are now among the most popular and valuable in British art, he was never financially successful. He became a member of the establishment after he was elected to the Royal Academy at the age of 52. His work was embraced in France, where he sold more than in his native England and inspired the Barbizon School.

Bertie Pearce is a Graduate of Manchester University and a Member of the Inner Magic Circle with Gold Star.   He is an Author, Lecturer and Performer.

Mr Punch, that irreverent puppet character, has inspired opera, ballet and punk: his likeness can be seen on Victorian silverware and even video games. He is descended from the Italian 15th-century commedia dell’arte tradition and even today this Lord of Misrule practises his anarchic slapstick, all the while proclaiming: “That's the way to do it!”

Matthew Williams is a Curator of Cardiff Castle and a Published Author in Art and Architectural Journals.

Never before opened to the public, Dumfries House is a forgotten Georgian gem, designed by Adam and furnished by Chippendale and others. Once a home of the Marquesses of Bute, Matthew Williams has known and admired Dumfries House for twenty years. The story of its controversial rescue is both fascinating and entertaining.

John Ericson is a former Lecturer at the University of Bath where he was Director of Studies in the School of Education.

In this lively presentation John shares his knowledge and enthusiasm for wine and the contribution that ‘wine art’ makes to our colourful world. Wine can be a civilising influence upon us and it is made to be shared and enjoyed. As a consequence there are numerous wonderful paintings of wine being made and wine being drunk in celebration but it also lends itself to wicked cartoons and striking posters. In addition we shall examine wine labels from around the world which now display such style and creativity.

Barbara Askew is an Historian, Tour Guide and a London Blue Badge Guide since 1988.

Queen Victoria and especially Prince Albert had a genuine love for, knowledge of and commitment to the arts. Their patronage of the arts was a shared passion that lasted throughout their marriage. Strikingly, their collecting covered nearly every form of fine and decorative art as well as music and the theatre. It encompassed all periods and had an international reach. The royal couple keenly pursued their interest in the arts, often visiting painters and sculptors in their studios; on occasion they even offered advice about how to improve the art work they saw.

Dr James Lindow was the first Renaissance PhD from the Royal College of Art and the V&A.  He has convened and presented at international conferences, lectures widely in the UK and overseas and is currently the fine art underwriter in the City.   He has written articles on diverse aspects of the Renaissance and his book entitled “The Renaissance Palace in Florence – Magnificence and Splendour in fifteenth century Italy” was published by Ashgate Press in 2007 to widespread critical acclaim.

This lecture demonstrates the distinct contribution the urban palaces of Renaissance Italy made towards the development of the visual arts. Significantly many of the paintings, sculptures and decorative objects  from this period were originally intended for the domestic interior.  While a great number of the great palace facades  survive largely intact, their interiors have been lost or remain at best greatly altered since the 15th century. Examining diverse visual and written sources, together with surviving objects, the opulence of the Renaissance Palace interior  is vividly recreated, pursuing the speaker’s extensive research from his scholarly book, The Renaissance Palace in Florence: Magnificence and  Splendour in Fifteenth-Century Italy. 

Dr Mervyn Miller is an Archtitect, Town Planner and Historian.   He is a former Vice President of RIBA, an Author and authority on the Garden City Movement.

The garden city movement is a method of urban planning in which self-contained communities are surrounded by "greenbelts", containing proportionate areas of residences, industry, and agriculture. The idea was initiated in 1898 by Sir Ebenezer Howard in the United Kingdom.

Inspired by the utopian novel Looking Backward and Henry George's work Progress and Poverty, Howard published the book To-morrow: a Peaceful Path to Real Reform in 1898 (which was reissued in 1902 as Garden Cities of To-morrow). His idealised garden city would house 32,000 people on a site of 6,000 acres (2,400 ha), planned on a concentric pattern with open spaces, public parks and six radial boulevards, 120 ft (37 m) wide, extending from the centre. The garden city would be self-sufficient and when it reached full population, another garden city would be developed nearby. Howard envisaged a cluster of several garden cities as satellites of a central city of 58,000 people, linked by road and rail.

Dr Stephen Kershaw is an Author and Classics Tutor for Oxford University Dept. for Continuing Education.   He is Professor of History of Art for European Studies Programme of Rhodes College.

The Elgin Marbles, also known as the Parthenon Marbles, are a collection of classical Greek marble sculptures made under the supervision of the architect and sculptor Phidias and his assistants. They were originally part of the temple of the Pathenon and other buildings on the Acropolis of Athens.

In 1801 Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin obtained an official decree (a firman) from the Sublime Porte, the central government of the Ottoman Empire which were then the rulers of Greece. Elgin was also later approved by a second firman which allowed for the shipping of the marbles from the Piraeus. From 1801 to 1812, the Earl's agents removed about half of the surviving sculptures of the Parthenon, as well as sculptures from the Propylaea and Erechtheum. The Marbles were transported by sea to Britain. In Britain, the acquisition of the collection was supported by some, while some others, such as Lord Byron, likened the Earl's actions to vandalism or looting.

7.15 pm for 8.00 pm Lecture.   Tickets £15.00 each.   Booking September 2018

Alexandra Epps is an official Guide and Lecturer at Tate Modern, Tate Britain and Guildhall Art Gallery.  Pallant House Gallery Lecturer.  City Lit Institute Art History Tutor.  Alexandra’s background is in design having practised as a graphic designer running her own design consultancy for many years.

Co-author of the book Lord Mayor’s Portraits 1983-2014 (2015)

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 most certainly is gold.

Dr Paula Nuttal is an Art Historian, Author and Lecturer for the Courtauld Institute, National Gallery and V&A

The Nativity has been depicted in many different media, both pictorial and sculptural. Pictorial forms include murals, panel paintings, manuscript illustrations, stained glass windows and oil paintings.

From the 15th century onwards, the Adoration of the Magi increasingly became a more common depiction than the Nativity proper, partly as the subject lent itself to many pictorial details and rich colouration, and partly as paintings became larger, with more space for the more crowded subject. The scene is increasingly conflated with the Adoration of the Shepherds from the late Middle Ages onwards, though they have been shown combined on occasions since Late Antiquity. In the West the Magi developed large exotically-dressed retinues, which sometimes threaten to take over the composition by the time of the Renaissance; there is undoubtedly a loss of concentration on the religious meaning of the scenes in some examples, especially in 15th-century Florence, where large secular paintings were still a considerable novelty.

Valerie Woodgate is a Lecturer and Guide at Tate Britain and Tate Modern.   She runs courses at Pallant House Gallery, Chichester.

The careers of John Piper and Graham Sutherland followed surprisingly similar paths. Born in the same year, they worked a variety of media, producing astonishing bodies of work; each was an Official War Artist in the Second World War, creating moving and inspirational works of religious art.

Jackie Marsh-Hobbs is a freelance lecturer, guide, researcher and teacher, working at the Royal Pavilion, Preston Manor and various museums. She has taught courses on architecture, local history, house history and design at the University of Sussex, and is a guest lecturer at the University of Brighton. She researches and runs several tours of famous Brighton landmarks.

A delightful look at the history of pleasure piers, these elegant structures which are remarkable examples of Victorian engineering. Diverse in designs, often crowned with exotic palaces or pavilions. Places of entertainment, laughter and joy which have given untold pleasure to generations. As such, they are an important part of our social history.

Peter Warwick is an author, lecturer and historian specialising in naval and polar history.

The lecture explores the impact of the three voyages of discovery by Captain James Cook on European thought, art and science, illustrated by the drawingsand watercolours of Sydney Parkinson, the paintings of William Hodges and George Stubbs, the botanising of Sir Joseph Banks and the cartography of James Cook.

Pamela Campbell-Johnston is a lecturer for the Roayal Academy of Arts and recently curated a collection for the Lansdowne Club.

1935 was the Silver Jubilee of King George V and Queen Mary.   The lecture uses this event as a focus for looking back over the Art Deco period and looking forward to the evolving art of photography.

Richard Thomas is a former academic and a political and institutional analyst in the field of International Development.

Hadrian was the first Roman Emperor to realise that the Empire could not continue to expand. He marked the boundaries of the Empire with walls and massive fortifications. He also decided to glorify Rome and Greece with major buildings to impress enemies and vassal states to persuade them that Rome was still powerful. Hadrian’s Wall, the Pantheon, Tivoli Palace, the Castel Sant’Angelo and other buildings erected in his honour will be illustrated in this talk.  

Sian Walters is a lecturer at the National Gallery and Surrey University.

This lecture looks at the age old art of illusionist painting, drawing particularly on examples of works displayed in the National Gallery, London.

Dr Caroline Shenton was formerly Director of the Parliamentary Archives at Westminster; she is an historian and author.

The 16th October 1834 was for contemporaries one of the greatest events of their lives. It was for them like the assassination of JFK or the death of Princess Diana. It was something that they remembered through the rest of their lives and its repercussions carried on into the early 20th Century.

Gavin Plumley is a writer, broadcaster and lecturer at the National Gallery, V&A and British Museum.

At the turn of the 19th century, Vienna was the capital of a vast empire and one of the most exciting artistic laboratories in the world. It produced painters such as Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele and Oskar Kokoschka, architects like Otto Wagner, Adolf Lood and Josef Hoffman, the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, the composer Gustav Mahler and the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. Looking at these and other figures in context, the talk asks how and why the City of Dreams became a cultural hotbed around 1900.

Linda Smith is a guide and lecturer at Tate Britain, Tate Modern and the Dulwich Picture Gallery.

This lecture looks at English painting during the so-called “Long Sixteenth Century” ie the tumultuous reigns of the five Tudor monarchs. Significant artistic developments were made during the period, largely by talented immigrants such as Hans Holbein and Marcus Gheeraerts. Important works by these and other artists will be examined ,paying particular attention to the enigmatic and elaborate symbolism. Portraiture dominated the period, and images of the great monarchs and personalities of the age are compared and contrasted in terms of the functions they were intended to fulfil. Other genres like religious subjects and the early beginnings of landscape painting are also featured. The talk ties the works firmly to their political, social and personal context, and will also address the intriguing issue of why the degree of naturalism used in painting varied widely during the period.

Dr Janet Robson is an art historian, author and lecturer for the Courtauld Institute and for Birkbeck.

Our lecture looks at the origins of Santa Claus. The familiar image of the man with the white beard and red suit was to a large degree the creation of an American illustrator in the 1860s. This lecture follows the transformation of St Nicholas through 1600 years of history as Dr Robson traces how medieval Europe made Saint Nicholas into one of the greatest miracle-workers of all time – and sets the story within its Christmas context.

Matthew Williams is a Lecturer and former Curator of Cardiff Castle and an author of its history.   He is a longstanding member of NADFAS (now AS)

Dumfries House is a Palladian Country House in Ayrshire, Scotland. It is located within a large estate, around 2 miles west of Cumnock. Noted for being one of the few such houses with much of its original 18th-century furniture still present, including specially commissioned Thomas Chippendale pieces, the house and estate is now owned in charitable trust by The Great Steward of Scotland's Dumfries House Trust, which maintains it as a visitor attraction and hospitality and wedding venue. Both the house and the gardens are listed as significant aspects of Scottish heritage.

Mary Yule is an author and Lecturer at the National Gallery and at the Wallace Collectionh

The vast number of sculpture parks and trails around Britain seems to be one of the nation's best-kept secrets. Scattered across the country, they offer a wide variety of artworks to be enjoyed outdoors and the general ambience and landscape of each is uniquely different.  

Vivienne Lawes is a lecturer at Sotheby's Institute, writer,curator, art journalist and author.

This lecture explores the way in which the East India Company developed its methods of trade and how the 18th Century trade with China was established and concludes with the difference between Chinoiserie and Chinese export ware.

Anthony Peers is an author and Architectural Historian, a  Fellow of the Society of Antiquarians and an Historic Building Consultant.

The Town Hall in Victoria Square was the country's first truly civic building. It was built as a place for the people, an elaborate music venue – England's first great concert hall.

Previously concerts were held in cathedrals or smaller concert venues seating less than 800 but the Town Hall changed all of that. Offering a podium for political speechmaking, public gatherings and music, the space was designed to be at the beating heart of the developing city, a building that matched the city's status as an industrial powerhouse.

In 1831 a design competition was published in the Times, which attracted 67 entries from architects across the country.

The winning design, by Joseph Hansom & Edward Welsh, was influenced chiefly by the Roman temple of Castor and Pollux, albeit scaled down by a quarter. It took over two years to construct, a period dogged with tragedy and misfortune. A monument to two stone-masons killed during its construction can still be found in St. Philip's graveyard.

Shirley Smith is a Fellow of Royal Society of Arts, a part-time lecturer at the University of East Anglia and the Department of Continuing Education, Cambridge University.

Renaissance Italy was not a country but a collection of republics and duchies, in which the ruling families displayed their wealth and power, not only on the battlefield but by commissioning works from the best artists, musicians and architects of the day.
This re-birth of learning brought renewed interest in classical art, and in Mantua  the Gonzaga family commissioned Andrea Mantegna, renowned for his paintings of the ancient world, to sustain their family image; his wonderful paintings in the Camera degli Sposi looks like a natural portrayal of family life.
Isabella d’Este, married to Francesco Gonzago, was one of the greatest patrons of the age, and she managed to collect some sixteen hundred valuable antiquities.  But inevitably the family funds ran out, and many of their great paintings were bought by Charles I and shipped to England, although Oliver Cromwell subsequently sold many of them to royalty in Spain.

Dougal Skeggs.   Writer, Artist, Television Presenter.

Vincent van Gogh in 1880 was a 27-year-old failure: a despised and rejected clergyman in a grim backwater mining town in Belgium. Against all the odds he decided to become a serious painter. By 1886, Vincent thought he was good enough to move to Paris to live with his brother Theo, an art dealer specializing in Impressionist painters. With Theo's help, Vincent found a little group of fellow spirits including Toulouse-Lautrec and Emile Bernard, and organized a show of their work in a downscale café.

Gauguin was struck by one painting in the exhibit. Van Gogh's Two Sunflowers.   Gauguin coveted this painting, offering in exchange his best work to date: By the Shore of the Lake, painted in Martinique. These men were drawn together for two reasons: first, by their urgency to find new ways to express their visions; then by their uncertain status as aging newcomers struggling in the highly competitive impressionist art market. Two lost souls on the highway of life; such people sometimes find a new path to Parnassus.

Andrew Davies is an author and blue badge guide.   he is also an extra-mural lecturer for London, Essex and Open Universities.

London’s stations have always been powerful, iconic structures. Andrew explores their history and architecture, from Charing Cross to Waterloo via Victoria and Liverpool Street. In particular, we will look at St Pancras and the Sir John Betjeman connection. We will also look at the architecture of some of London's underground stations and other stations both home and abroad.

Jane Gardiner is a lecturer at V&A, Sotheby's Institute, National Trust and London University.

The stylistic development of glass produced in Venice from the late 15th century to the late 17th century, seen through actual objects and through paintings.

During this lecture, we will look at the early history of glassmaking in Venice, the material itself and the techniques involved in forming and decorating the pieces.

Peter Warwick is an author, lecturer and historian specialising in naval and polar history

Captain James Cook’s three extraordinary voyages of discovery provided unprecedented information about the Pacific Ocean and the people who lived on its islands and shores.  Observations were well documented by men employed to travel with Cook.  Sydney Parkinson’s exquisite drawings and watercolours recorded the flora and fauna collected by Sir Joseph Banks.  William Hodges’ paintings illustrated Tahiti, Easter Island and the Antarctic. Together with James Cook’s own cartography, their works contributed significantly to the development of European thought, art and science in the late 18th Century.

The Rt. Revd. Christopher Herbert was, until recently, Bishop of St Albans and a member of the House of Lords.  He has an MPhil and PhD in Art History from the University of Leicester and has also been awarded two honorary doctorates and is an honorary citizen of Fano, Italy.  He has lectured at the National Gallery, the Courtauld Institute and Westminster Abbey.

In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, magi from the East came to Jerusalem asking: “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we have observed his star at its rising and have come to pay him homage.”

So opens the second chapter of St Matthew's Gospel, the only biblical account of this nocturnal visit.  In contrast to St Luke’s Gospel, Matthew omits any mention of Mary and Joseph’s trip to Bethlehem to be registered, a crowded inn, a sheltering manger, or watching shepherds startled by an angel’s announcement of the Messiah’s birth.

Instead, the first Gospel focuses on the journey of these eastern emissaries, who see an unusual star rising, interpret it as an omen that they should investigate, and follow its path first to King Herod of Judea and then to Bethlehem, where it appears to stop above a house in which a child had recently been born.  Entering the house, the men pay homage to the infant Jesus and offer him gifts: gold, frankincense and myrrh. 

Angela Findlay is an artist and freelance lecturer with a long career of teaching in prisons and young Offender Institutions

Years of working as an artist within the Criminal Justice System in England and Germany have given Angela unique insights into the destructive and costly cycle of crime, prisons and re-offending. In this thought-provoking talk she offers a deeper understanding of the minds, lives and challenges of offenders. With extraordinary slides of art projects and prisoner’s art, she demonstrates how within any chosen creative discipline there are vital opportunities for offenders to confront their crimes and develop the key life skills which are essential in leading a positive and productive life.

Frank Woodgate is a Lecturer and Guide at Tate Britain, Tate Modern and Dulwich Picture Gallery

This talk examines the work of one of the outstanding figures of 20th century sculpture, an artist who achieved an international reputation for her monumental works depicting the human figure, birds and other animals. Sadly she died in her early 60s but, from the first small sculpture acquired by the Tate Gallery (when she was a student of 21) until her death, she produced an astonishing body of work. Her bronzes varied in scale and feeling, from small, threatening birds to the life-size, tranquil Walking Madonna in Salisbury Cathedral Close.

Frink’s work will be examined in the context of great British and European predecessors such as Henry Moore, Auguste Rodin and Alberto Giacometti, as well as her contemporaries, including Reg Butler, Jean Fautrier and Germaine Richier.

Brian Stater is a Lecturer in Architectural History and a member of the Historical and Fine Art Photography Association.

Should we accept that the very best photographs can be regarded as Fine Art? This question is at the heart of a lecture which argues that photography can equal, not to say exceed, more traditional disciplines in the key genres of portraiture, landscape and still life. Photography, moreover, has carved its own area of excellence in depicting the human condition. All these ideas are discussed with reference to the work of some of the acknowledged masters of photography, including Henri Cartier-Bresson, Fay Godwin, Bill Brandt, Ansel Adams and Wolfgang Tillmans.

Sue Rollin is a Tour Guide, Author, Lecturer and Interpretor.

A look at the art, architecture and magnificent royal courts of the Mughal emperors of India, whose creative building culminated in that most sublime of monuments, the Taj Mahal, constructed by Shah Jahan in memory of his beloved queen. The Rajput rajas and maharajas, subject first to the Mughals and then the British, were well rewarded for their loyalty and service. They built majestic fort-palaces in their state capitals where they held glittering courts and sponsored artists and craftsmen who created distinctive styles of art.

Bertie Pearce is a Lecturer, Writer and member of the Inner Magic Circle.

Charles John Huffam Dickens brought into the world a staggering array of wonderful characters with orphans, starving children, misers, murderers and abusive school teachers among them. People such as Mr Mcawber, Fagin and Abel Magwitch remain in one’s literary psyche long after the books are put down. Largely self educated, Dickens possessed the genius to become the greatest writer of his age with 15 major novels and countless short stories and articles. This lecture looks at the life and places of Dickens through his characters.

Eveline Eaton is a freelance Lecturer and Chair of the Dresden Trust.

The story of Expressionism begins as a reaction against Impressionism – an idea first explored by the Post-Impressionists (Gauguin, van Gogh, Cézanne and Seurat) and then taken up by young French and German artists in the turbulent times of the early twentieth century. By means of bright colour and bold brushwork, the ‘Wild Beasts’ or ‘Fauves’ (Matisse, Derain, Vlaminck) expressed their ideas in a highly aggressive mode. The German Expressionists in Dresden (Kirchner and the ‘Brücke’ group) and in Munich (Kandinsky and the ‘Blue Riders’) also looked to the importance of African/Oceanic “primitivism” and the decorative elements of painting and sculpture to produce a forcefully emotional art which nevertheless was justified by intellectual argument.

Caroline Knight is an Architectural Historian and Lecturer

Burghley House (Lincolnshire) and Hatfield House (Hertfordshire) are two of the finest Tudor and Jacobean houses of England. Robert Cecil, Lord Burghley, was Secretary of State to Elizabeth I from 1558 until his death. He rebuilt Burghley as a great country house, fit to entertain the queen. His son Robert, Earl of Salisbury, was Secretary of State to Elizabeth and James I. The king offered him the royal palace at Hatfield, which Robert rebuilt as an innovative house in the early 17thC. These houses, still belonging to their Cecil descendants, have fascinating collections, and are open to the public.

Dr. Sally Hoban is a Broadcaster and Lecturer on art, design and antiques.

The Lunar Society of Birmingham was a dinner club and informal learned society of prominent figures in the Midlands Enlightenment, including industrialists, natural philosophers and intellectuals, who met regularly between 1765 and 1813 in Birmingham, England. At first called the Lunar Circle, "Lunar Society" became the formal name by 1775. The name arose because the society would meet during the full moon, as the extra light made the journey home easier and safer in the absence of street lighting. The members cheerfully referred to themselves as "lunarticks", a pun on lunatics.

Linda Smith is an Art Historian, Guide and Lecturer

Hogarth is nowadays mostly remembered as a talented satirist, but there is much more to him than that. He was extremely ambitious in other artistic fields, including portraiture, history painting, and art theory. He was also a tireless self-promoter and entrepreneur, with a real and practical concern for the status of his profession. This talk tracks his career from humble copperplate engraver to successful painter, showing a wide variety of images which demonstrate his exceptional originality and inventiveness. Above all, however, it is his unparalleled eye for absurdity and human weakness which not only tells us so much about his times, but gives us food for thought about our own.

This lecture will highlight the fascinating ceremonies which have played such an important part in the history of England from the earliest times to our present Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. It includes the Orders of Chivalry, investitures, the annual Garter Ceremony at Windsor and why St George became our patron saint.The State opening of Parliament brings together Peers, Judges, Officers of State and Bishops to hear the Queen’s speech. They all wear ceremonial dress whose design has changed little since Medieval and Tudor times. From the orb to the sceptre, it will examine the significance of the symbols of sovereignty.

John Bloomfield is a costume designer known for, among others, 'The Six Wives of Henry VIII', 'Robin Hood - Prince of Thieves' and the original series of 'Poldark'.

The Great Exhibition at the Crystal Palace in London in 1851 was the first of a series of international exhibitions that have continued, in one form or another, to the present day. The content of these exhibitions gave nations and individual companies of the world the opportunity to display their specialised skills and present new ideas and products to a much wider public. This lecture looks at major international exhibitions held during the nineteenth century and focuses on the important changes taking place at this time, in both society and design, including the enormous impact of the Industrial Revolution and how it came to influence the decorative arts.

The National Portrait Gallery (NPG) was the first portrait gallery in the world when it opened in 1856. The gallery moved in 1896 to its current site at St Martin's Place, off Trafalgar Square, and adjoining the National Gallery. It has been expanded twice since then. The National Portrait Gallery also has three regional outposts at Beningbrough Hall, Bodelwyddan Castle and Montacute House.

Gertrude Jekyll (29 November 1843—8 December 1932) was an influential British horticulturist, garden designer, artist and writer. She created over 400 gardens in the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States, and wrote over 1,000 articles for magazines such as Country Life and William Robinson's The Garden. Jekyll has been described as "a premier influence in garden design" by English and American gardening enthusiasts.

Roger demolishes myths about the paintings, in particular that they represent Bible storytelling for illiterate churchgoers. He points out that many of the images are not of Bible stories and that they are meaningless unless you know the stories already. He believes they had several roles, including decoration, worship and contemplation.

The 1992 Windsor Castle fire occurred on Friday, 20 November 1992 in Windsor Castle, west of London, the largest inhabited castle in the world and one of the official residences of the British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II. The castle suffered severe damage in a fire, and was fully repaired within the next few years at a cost of £36.5 million. The question of how the funds required should be found raised important issues about the financing of the monarchy, and led to Buckingham Palace being opened to the public for the first time to help to pay for the restoration.

In the tangled narrative of 20th century art, there is no more colourful or influential figure than Sergei Pavlovich Diaghilev. The son of a bankrupt Russian vodka distiller, Diaghilev would reinvent himself as the greatest impresario of all time, conquering first Europe and then the world with the Ballets Russes. This was more than just a dance company; it was a creative movement which, from its inception, drew to itself the greatest musical, theatrical and artistic talents of the day.

Imogen has written "One of the greatest joys of our heritage must be the Luttrell Psalter. It was made in the early part of the C14th, commissioned by Sir Geoffrey Luttrell who owned considerable estates in Lincolnshire. Instead of going for what might be thought of as a more standard book of Psalms, he has chosen to have his decorated with the teeming life of rural Lincolnshire. From his book we learn how daily life was conducted from farming and cooking scenes to the man who delivered water. Monsters also romp cheerfully, mixed in with saints and biblical stories. The Luttrell Psalter doesn’t quite stand alone; comparisons can be made with other books, but the artists’ sense of the ridiculous and keen eye for colour and detail is second to none."

In order to fully appreciate any pieces of silver, it is essential to look at them in the context of the social customs and ways of life of the periods in which they were made. Only then can the reasons for such things as silver chamber pots, elaborate dressing-table sets and lids on cups, be properly understood. Why for example were such extraordinary objects as Clock Salts produced in the Tudor period, and, what was mustard served in before 1760? All will be revealed during this talk, which will use slides of contemporary paintings and of objects to illustrate the evolution of social custom from 1066 through to the early 19th.century.

In 2015 Europe will commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo. This special lecture offers an artistic and cultural appreciation of the battle that was a defining moment in European history. It shows how artists have interpreted Waterloo and so influenced our understanding of what actually happened on 18 June 1815. The paintings, drawings and caricatures are the language of the age and are often so powerful they alone have influenced our perceptions of the battle and its subsequent interpretation. We see today what the artist wanted us to see. How true to the history are their impressions? The Art of Waterloo is a fascinating story.

Ian Kelly is an actor, writer and the author of four internationally acclaimed biographies.

Marie Antoine (Antonin) Carême ( 8 June 1784 – 12 January 1833) was an early practitioner and exponent of the elaborate style of cooking known as grande cuisine, the "high art" of French cooking: a grandiose style of cookery favoured by both international royalty and by the newly rich of Paris.

Yasha Beresiner is a past Master of the Worshipful Company of Makers of Playing Cards. He is a City Guide and Editor of Cityguide Magazine.

It is surprising to learn that today’s playing cards date back to 1377. Decks from 1475 still survive. The English deck is of French origin and the Company of Makers of Playing Cards was founded in 1628 to protect English makers from French importations. Cards were used as a medium of communication, propaganda and education. Modern cards follow in these old traditions with some wonderful decks of today for collectors.

Anne Sebba is a British biographer, lecturer journalist and former Reuters foreign correspondent.

Born Bessie Wallis Warfield on 19 June 1896 in Blue Ridge Summit, Pennsylvania; died 24 April 1986 (aged 89), Bois de Boulogne, Paris. Wallis was an American socialite. Her third husband, Prince Edward, Duke of Windsor, formerly King Edward VIII, abdicated his throne to marry her. Her first marriage, to U.S. naval officer Win Spencer, ended in divorce. In 1934, during her second marriage to Ernest Simpson, she allegedly became the mistress of Edward, Prince of Wales.[2] Two years later, after Edward's accession as king, Wallis divorced her second husband in order to marry Edward. Subsequently, Edward abdicated to avoid a constitutional crisis thus enabling him to marry 'the woman I love'.