The Birmingham born and trained artist Walter Langley was a pioneer of the Newlyn School. In the 1880s, he divided his time between Birmingham and Newlyn and he was soon joined by fellow members of the Birmingham Art Circle including Edwin Harris, William Banks Fortescue, William Breakspeare  and Frank Richards  Our speaker Alison Bevan is an acknowledged expert on the Newlyn School and her book 'The Art of the Newlyn School: Paintings of Cornish Life and Light' is to be published next month to accompany a national touring exhibition she has curated

Drawing on his own experiences as both a child and adult actor, our speaker Tyler Butterworth reveals the pains and the pleasures of a career in the theatre, taking us through the intricate processes of putting on a play from the actor's perspective, from the casting session to the curtain call and all stops in between, eg how props can let you down at crucial moments and how to survive when out of work.  Tyler gave us a very enjoyable talk on The Golden Age of British Comedy in June 2024

Due to ill health Alexandra Epps is unable to deliver the originally scheduled lecture "Priceless Peggy"

Dr Paul Norgate will speak to us about Wilfred Owen instead.

Paul Cezanne said he would astonish Paris with an apple, and he did just that. His still lifes, landscapes portraits and nudes rewrote the rulebook on composition and form, revolutionised the way we see and the way we look, creating a new visual language which changed art forever.  Our lecturer, Cindy Polemis, is an art historian and art guide.

For feedback and voting purposes only.

See Whats On/Special Events for details

Angels don't speak, they sing, inspiring much wonderful music. This talk by Patrick Craig will investigate their roles as guardians, messengers, and fighters through imaginative music by Britten, Elgar and Mendelssohn, Bach, Mozart and Walton.   Patrick is a Vicar Choral at St Paul's Cathedral, with a lifelong interest in the arts.

Gavin Plumley's outstanding lecture in February 2025 on the two Gustavs, Mahler and Klimt, has brought him back to an earlier artist, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, changing the way we viewed the world through art.  Landscape had previously been a decorative backdrop to dramas both sacred and profane but in Breugel's hands the landscape became the focus, as he pioneered a whole new way of thinking about the environment and our individual places within a shifting cosmos.

This lecture tells the story of 20th century fashion design, tracing how clothes, textiles and accessories were influenced by contemporary history.

It includes the elegant fashions of the Edwardian era, the glamour of the 1920s and 1930s, the austerity of the 1940s, the futuristic fashions of the 1950s, the liberating styles of the 1960s and the avant-garde fashions of the 1970s to the present day.

Sally Hoban has a PhD in History from the University of Birmingham and is a specialist Art & Design Historian and Antiques expert. She lectures regularly to Arts Society groups both in Britain and abroad and she has broadcast on BBC television and radio.

Sally writes widely on her special interests which include antique clothing and textiles, and English silver. She has published articles in The Antiques Bulletin, national and international media, and she is the author of Miller’s Collecting Modern Design. Dr Hoban is an Honorary Research Fellow at Birmingham University.

To kick off our seasonal celebrations, musician and broadcaster Sandy Burnett will share his selection of much-loved Christmas tunes.  Expect sparkling moments from The Nutcracker ballet, a heartwarming ballad from Mel Torme, a heavenly chorus from J S Bach, and something more cynical from Eartha Kitt.

Further details and application form to follow

This lecture is a colourful introduction to the secret world of our 2000-mile inland waterway network, looking at all aspects of their exceptional artistic, architectural and engineering features.  Once described as a "poor man’s art gallery" our lecture will be tailored to include local and regional examples which reflect the unique distinctiveness of  our inland waterways. Our speaker Roger Butler is a landscape architect and experienced writer, photographer and lecturer.

For feedback and voting purposes only.

See Whats On/Special Events for details

The remarkable way in which Wodehouse over his 75 year career as a published author populated Mayfair and the West End with scores of characters is one of the most elaborate overlapping fictional worlds ever created.  Wodehouse lived in this locale for several years and many of his well-loved characters lived here in a world which was vanishing even as he immortalised it.  Our speaker, Richard Burnip combines acting, writing and lecturing.

From their early days as educational aids and status indicators from over 300 years ago, “Baby Houses" have held a special fascination.  With furnishings created by master guildsmen recording domestic life, they are now playthings and collectables with glimpses of history in enchanting detail.  Our speaker, Amanda Herries read archaeology and anthropology at Cambridge and now lectures and broadcasts widely.

Isabella d’Este (1474 – 1539) stands out as a formidable woman in an age where women had little public power.  One of the first and greatest female patrons and art collectors of the Renaissance, her court in Mantua was filled with writers and poets of distinction. She had a clever, educated and entitled voice singing out from thousands of letters which she composed in her meticulously designed study, and images from Da Vinci to Titian bring alive a woman whose eye for fashion was every bit as keen as her eye for art. 

Sarah Dunant is a well-known novelist, broadcaster and critic, now living in Gloucestershire.   Having read history at Cambridge, Sarah then worked for many years as a cultural journalist in radio and television.  Her last six novels have been set within the Italian Renaissance, including her lecture to us on the Borgia family.

Fortuitously, Sarah’s new book featuring Isabella is due to be published the week before the lecture.  She is also to record a series of 5 talks on Isabelle to be broadcast by BBC R4 at the end of June

The temple complex of Angkor is the greatest archaeological site in Asia.  There are many temples, the most important is Angkor Wat, built in the 12th century, the biggest religious monument in the world.  In this lecture, Denise Heywood will reveal the history of the Khmer empire and its flowering of sculptural art.  Author, lecturer, photographer and journalist, Denise lived in Cambodia for three years in the 1990s and has been a scholar and enthusiast of Southeast Asia ever since.

Please Note - Our AGM (commencing at 10:30am) will precede this lecture.

Taking one mythological work from each of the cities of Venice, Florence and Rome, Helen Oakden, will explore the extraordinary secrets of Renaissance marriage.  The works of Giorgione, Botticelli and Raphael show the differences between the cities, their attitudes towards brides, ideals of love and even bizarre anatomical beliefs, and the analysis will uncover the politics, personalities of the rich and famous.  Helen is head of the History of Art Dept at St Mary’s School Ascot.

For voting purposes only.  See Special Events for full details

Most prominent artists in the Western world of the 19th century owned some Japanese artefacts: eg woodblock prints, ceramics, silk textiles or furnishings coming from the opening of Japan to western trade in the 1850s.  The seminal work of woodblock artists like Hokusai created a new way of looking at the world which inspired artists like Toulouse-Lautrec, Van Gogh, Monet, Degas, Whistler, Vuillard and many more.  The term “Japonisme” was coined to reflect this Japanese theme, which brought about a new form of Western design aesthetic through Modernism.  Our speaker, Suzanne Perrin, lectures on many linked Japanese topics.

In 1897 Gustav Klimt and colleagues broke away from the imperially endorsed art institutions in Vienna and founded the Secession.  In that year Gustav Mahler arrived to take charge of the opera house in the city.  Our lecturer Gavin Plumley compares these two fin-de-siecle talents and finds what fundamentally links and indeed, divides them.

This affectionate talk, making extensive use of images and sounds from the Museum of Carpet archive in Kidderminster, explores first the historical background to carpet making in Kidderminster and charts the rise of this great industry.  We then go through the gates to explore the workings of a 20th century carpet factory in the town and the work and lives of the generations of Kidderminster people who were ‘on the carpets’.  Our speaker, David Laverty, was Head of History for 21 years at King Charles I School, Kidderminster.

Our Lecturer Dr Graham Jones had a distinguished career as a musician in the British Army. After nearly forty years he retired as the Senior Director of Music, Household Division and Director of Music, Coldstream Guards - a position unequalled throughout military music in Great Britain. Graham is now enjoying a second career as a guest conductor, speaker, lecturer, recording consultant and educator.

The UK provides some of the biggest ceremonial music in the world and arguably the best in the world… but why is that? How do the military prepare for major events-for instance, The State Opening of Parliament, State Visits, Remembrance Day, Royal Weddings and even a State Funeral. Graham will enlighten us.

Click here for further details and an application form.

Landscape is a way of life for our famous photographer and lecturer, Charlie Waite.  In discussing his work, Charlie refers to the great American landscape photographer, Ansel Adams, from whom he draws much inspiration.  Charlie was an actor for the first 10 years of his professional life, becoming fascinated by theatrical lighting and design which gradually led to photography where he established a world-wide reputation with numerous solo exhibitions in Tokyo, Brisbane, New York, Sydney and California.

For voting purposes only.  See Special Events for full details

Dame Laura Knight was the first woman elected to full membership of the Royal Academy.  For nearly 80 years Laura painted famous people such as George Bernard Shaw and stars of theatre, ballet and circus as well as gypsies.  In contrast she was an official war artist and attended the Nuremburg Trials.  Our speaker, Harry Fletcher is a practising artist with work shown in the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition as well as tutoring at the Open University.

Alongside his street art, Banksy has been creating works for sale for more than 20 years.  This British contemporary artist might seem like a graffiti artist living life for a laugh and a headline, but the art world has caught up with his popular appeal and Banksy is earning his place in art history.  Truly independent, highly socially involved and with a dry British wit Mariska Beekenkamp-Wladimoroff introduces him to us. 

It is said in theatrical history that the 1970s and ‘80s were the golden age of British comedy, known as Variety.  It was a world of comedians, impressionists, of TV shows and end-of piers shows, of unusual acts and eccentric dances, of much-loved people: Morecambe and Wise, Bruce Forsyth.  In this unashamedly nostalgic lecture, and sharing his connection with this world Tyler Butterworth will go back and explore the acts, the places and the people that made us laugh, asking what’s happened to comedy today?

In this lecture Sarah Lenton charts opera from its classical 17th century beginnings to its evolution in the 18th and on through war and revolution to the 19th.  As we hit the troubled 20th century the genre begins to wilt, but to our surprise, it’s landed in the 21st in good shape with more festivals and opera houses than ever. On the way we discover how closely opera connects with the politics and tastes of the people who pay for it. Sarah has spent her working life in theatre.

Please Note - Our AGM (commencing at 10:30am) will precede this lecture.

The history of Britain is intricately woven with the history of textiles.  Following World War II there was a desire for change, colour and inspiration in the home.  This energy and inspiration, led by female textile designers, was destined to revolutionise design internationally.

Ashley Gray celebrates their vision, influences and determination which successfully brought modern and contemporary art into the home through their designs.  Ashley is a leading specialist and curator in the key art discipline of modern textiles.

In Greek legend, Pandora was created specifically to cause trouble to men. By opening her box, this was achieved.  This lecture looks at the story’s original sources, drawing parallels with both Eve in Genesis and Galatea in Ovid, then showing how ballets, operas and plays - eg Coppelia, The Winter’s Tale, My Fair Lady and Educating Rita – have developed the theme of a creation that runs out of control. Our lecturer, Mary Sharp, is an experienced broadcaster and teacher with a particular expertise in literature and drama.

Made in the 1330s for Sir Geoffrey Luttrell of Irnham Manor, Lincolnshire, this Book of Psalms gives a valuable glimpse into the England of that time.  Its pages are inhabited by a menagerie of outrageous grotesques which lead us into the mind of a leading baronial patron and the artists who served him. 

Explore with Michelle Brown the Luttrells and their world through this great artistic epitaph.  Michelle is Professor Emerita of Medieval Manuscript Studies and Curator of Illuminated Manuscripts and lecturer at Birkbeck and Morley College and has many publications to her name.

One of the top authorities on glass in the UK and one of our members, Charles Hajdamach, contrasts the achievements of these two great French masters of glass.  Charles was Director (1974 –2003) of the former Broadfield House Glass Museum, Kingswinford and the author of numerous books and articles on glass.

Lecture at our Christmas Lunch at Stourbridge Rugby Club
Now fully booked, wait list in operation

James Campbell tells us about E H Shepard, the illustrator for the Winnie the Pooh stories and The Wind in the Willows.

Click here for further details and booking form

The National Gallery’s collection begins with works from the early 13th Century and finishes with the Impressionists in the late 19th.   The stories behind the pictures are interesting, amusing and sometimes surprising.  Restoration, cleaning and display all change how we view a painting. It is also important to remember that no painting was produced to hang on the walls of a London gallery. Linda Collins is a freelance lecturer.

The tragic history of the Atlantic slave trade is well documented but why was it condoned for so many centuries and what finally triggered its abolition? The art of the time supplies answers, showing the different perspectives of different people at different times. Ultimately art was also pivotal in providing the propaganda which helped to change hearts and minds – indeed history itself.  It is a fascinating story as told by Philip Bushill-Matthews.    Philip ran businesses in Europe and the UK for 35 years before serving as a West Midlands MEP in Brussels.

Keith Bonser describes how Caravaggio (1571-1610) came into his life - a personal journey which embraces the story of the artist’s life and painting, epitomising the ability of Art to inspire anyone.  Keith was in education for 38 years.  A week-end break in Dublin introduced him to Caravaggio and life has never quite been the same since.

Lecture at Society's 25th Anniversary Lunch.

5th July 25th Anniversary Lunch at Stone Manor Hotel, Stone, nr Kidderminster.

Guest Speaker Will Farmer of “The Antiques Roadshow” Click here for Booking Form

Ivor Novello’s career was extraordinary by any measure: composer, playwright, film idol, stage star. Novello was certainly the master of the romantic waltz song, which sustains his reputation today. But there is much more to his genius than ‘Dear Ivor’ and wistful nostalgia. With examples from his songs, scripts and films, this lecture – with audio and video examples - goes to the heart of Novello as an instinctive and innovating force in film and on stage in his day. The range of his music, the wit of his writing, the individuality of his acting – all fuse into a unique ability to realize the power of dramatic performance time and time again.

John Snelson has been fascinated by musicals all his life and is now a leading expert in British musical theatre (the subject of his PhD). His publications include Andrew Lloyd Webber (Yale University Press) and chapters in many authoritative reference works. He is especially known for exploring musicals – British and American – in the light of not just the music and the stage, but society and culture to reveal what makes them so appealing, enduring and important. He is well known as a writer and speaker on all aspects of the lyric stage – musicals, opera, ballet – and has written many programme articles for leading companies in the UK and abroad. John has given talks for, among others, the Royal Opera House, English National Opera, the Garsington and Glyndebourne festivals and for BBC radio. For 20 years he worked for the Royal Opera House. He currently lectures at Goldsmiths, University of London, and is completing a book on British musical theatre for Bloomsbury Publishing.

The New Yorker was founded in 1925 by Harold Ross, who wanted to create a sophisticated humor magazine that would be different from other, perceivably "corny" humor publications he had worked on.  Since then, the NY has set the gold standard in cartoon humour, boasting names such as James Thurber, Charles Addams, Per Arno and Peter Steiner.  However, famous names did not always receive star treatment.  Cartoons would be gone over by Ross himself,, the editorial department, and a number of staff writers. and then often would be rejected or sent back to artists with requested amendments. At one point in the early 1940s, the quality of the artwork submitted to the magazine seemed to improve. It later was found out that the office boy (a teen-aged Truman Capote) had been acting as a volunteer art editor, dropping pieces he didn't like down the far edge of his desk.  Over the years, several of the magazine's cartoons have climbed to a higher plateau of fame. One 1928 cartoon drawn by Carl Rose and captioned by E. B. White shows a mother telling her daughter, "It's broccoli, dear." The daughter responds, "I say it's spinach and I say the hell with it." The phrase "I say it's spinach" entered the vernacular (and three years later, the Broadway musical Face the Music included Irving Berlin's musical number entitled "I Say It's Spinach (And the Hell with It)").   The most reprinted cartoon from the NY is Peter Steiner's 1993 drawing of two dogs at a computer, with one saying, "On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog".

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. He is fondly remembered in Stourbridge for his lecture on Giles, the cartoonist. 

In 1838 David Roberts, the son of an Edinburgh cobbler, travelled up the Nile as far as Abu Simbel then back to Cairo. He was the first western artist to record the great statues of Rameses II, the Temple of Amun and the statues of Amenhotep III. He then travelled from Cairo across the Sinai desert to the Holy Land. His paintings of Petra were the first that Europeans had seen of this wonder of the ancient world. He went on to Jerusalem, Nazareth, Tyre and Baalbec. David Roberts’s paintings of the landscapes, temples and statues he visited in a series of epic journeys were the first that Europeans had seen of the wonders of the ancient world and influenced travellers for a generation. 

Felicity Herring has an MA degree in Fine Art Valuation and BA in History and Economics. Programme Secretary of The Arts Society Blackmore Vale for four years and formerly committee member of Wimborne, she now  lectures on cruises, and to groups such as The National Trust, Rotary, yacht clubs, public school sixth forms, U3A and ProBus. She is a member of the Nelson Society and the 1805 Club.

Fanny Mendelssohn, four years older than her beloved brother Felix, was as talented as he. She received the same musical education and composed prolifically in her early teens. However, she was persuaded by her father to take a back seat in favour of young Felix. Fanny married an artist, Wilhelm Hensel, who was proud of her gifts and enjoyed collaborating with her. She continued to compose in private and even dared to conduct, organizing successful Sunday concerts in their Berlin home. Aged forty, in spite of her brother’s disapproval, she finally published a few compositions, and was beginning to receive public acclaim when she suffered a brain haemorrhage and died, aged just forty-two.  Of Fanny’s songs her famous brother said, “They prove that true music exists…that the soul is made of music.”   This talk will explore music by Fanny, portraits by Wilhelm, watercolours by Felix - and paintings by a friend of the family, Caspar David Friedrich.

Karin Fernald trained as an actor at RADA, working in theatre, TV (The Forsyte Saga)and radio before branching out with a solo show on Fanny Burney, which she turned into a popular lecture.  Since then, Karin has established a reputation for entertaining lectures on writers and artists from the mid-18th to 19th century, illustrated with slides of contemporary pictures and portraits from varied sources.  She has appeared at festivals in England, on tour in Japan, Australia and Europe, and at the University of Cape Town Summer School, and has performed at venues as varied as the National Portrait Gallery, the Foundling Museum, Dr. Johnson’s House and the Hurlingham Club. Her subjects are equally varied, including Hans Christian Andersen, Jane Austen, Fanny Burney, Edwin Landseer, Florence Nightingale, Perdita Robinson, Queen Victoria, Virginia Woolf . . .

Church buildings reflect both our national history and the development of local communities, often in ways not immediately apparent in the 21st century.  This talk will explore a selection of churches from our local area, dating from Anglo-Saxon times to the present day.

Tim Bridges was educated at Kings School Worcester and then at Exeter and York Universities. He is a Conservation Adviser for the Birmingham and West Midlands Victorian Society, and worked for over 20 years at Worcester City Museums. Tim lectures on architecture and history, leads guided visits, and has written several books.  He is well known to Stourbridge members from annual outings over many years.

The earliest cars were purely functional, lacking even the most basic of passenger comforts, such as doors or even windscreens to protect passengers from the elements. However, progress was rapid, and by the mid-1920s the automobile had entered its golden age. The Art Deco movement influenced designs and the ‘Great Gatsby’ era produced some of the most famous and fabulous cars ever built. This period was followed by the ‘Streamline Moderne’-influenced cars of the 1930s and 40s, with their curving forms and long horizontal lines. This talk lingers lovingly over some of the most beautiful cars ever built, from those earliest ‘horseless carriages’ to the supercars of the 21st century.  

A keen and accomplished photographer, Roger Mendham has gained distinctions from the Royal Photographic Society and is currently the President of the Surrey Photographic Association. A scientist by background, his interest in art was sparked by his wife’s academic studies into the History of Art and he has a particular interest in 20th century art.  With a focus on the visual aspects of art he has studied the evolution of photography from its earliest days in the early 1800s to its emergence as a major art form in the late 20th and now 21st centuries. An experienced public speaker, his talks are all richly illustrated with both his own and images from some of the leading photographers in history. 

THE 2022 CHRISTMAS LECTURE AND LUNCH 

at Stourbridge Rugby Club, Bridgnorth Road, Stourton, DY7 6QZ

 TUESDAY 6TH DECEMBER 2021 - 10.30 A.M coffee for 11 A.M. lecture

Find out, in this very light-hearted lecture, about the various ceremonial events that take place around Christmas time. Carol services, concerts and even Changing the Guard at Buckingham Palace and Windsor all play their part. How do the Chelsea Pensioners prepare and celebrate the festive season? All will be revealed so, come along and feel wrapped in a blanket of Christmas loveliness.

Graham Jones had a glittering career as a musician in the British Army.  After nearly forty years he retired as the Senior Director of Music, Household Division and Director of Music, Coldstream Guards - a position unequalled throughout military music in Great Britain.

Cost:  £36 per head, to include: tea/coffee on arrival; two course lunch; tea/coffee with mince pies; gratuities; lecture fees.

It is not inevitable that an artist's personality will be reflected in their work. But in the case of the Danish painter Vilhelm Hammershøi (1864-1916) there is a strong correspondence between the shy, reserved character described by friends, and the quiet interiority of his work. Hammershøi's subject is the domestic interior - occasionally inhabited by a single figure, more often empty; he shows us the spaces that contained, shaped and reflected his perceptions and feelings. His paintings combine abstract beauty with an emotional resonance. They make us reflect on the spaces we inhabit, and suggest a world beyond that which is ordinarily domestic. 

Dr Kathy McLauchlan is an art historian specialising in French painting and the academic tradition. She completed an MA in 19th century painting and a PhD on the work of art students at the French Academy in Rome at the Courtauld Institute, University of London. Kathy has worked at the Open University, Birkbeck College and Morley College, and is currently a course director of the Victoria & Albert Museum.

S.I.D.

Birmingham Town Hall was built in the 1830s to serve both as an emblem for the town and as a venue in which to hold its great public events. The design was selected by the town commissioners by means of an architectural competition: the presence of this grand edifice at the heart of the town would, they hoped, encourage inhabitants and visitors alike to think of ancient Rome - the great centre of classical civilisation – and reflect on the comparable achievements of modern day Birmingham.  However, with challenges at the stone quarries in Anglesey, strikes by the labour force, a fatal accident on site and delay upon delay, this was a far from straight forward building project: indeed, the architects as well as the contractors eventually succumbed to bankruptcy. Nevertheless, when it was finally completed the Town Hall was lauded as both ‘by far the cheapest building of its magnitude perhaps ever erected’ as well as ‘the pride of Birmingham and an ornament to England’.  Constructed with funds raised by a public rate – ‘built by the people for the people’ - from the outset the people of Birmingham have regarded this building as their own.

Anthony Peers is a freelance historic buildings consultant, Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and Deputy Chairman of the Ancient Monuments Society.  Educated as an Architectural Historian at Manchester University, he trained in building conservation at the Institute of Advanced Architectural Studies, York. After two years with SAVE Britain's Heritage, where he wrote 'Deserted Bastions', he worked with the English Heritage Listing Division on the review of military buildings.  In the mid-1990s Anthony was employed by the DTI in Bombay, India, setting up and running an innovative project to repair George Gilbert Scott's university buildings and training local architects and craftsmen in conservation techniques and philosophy. From 1998 until 2010, he worked as Rodney Melville & Partners' historian, involved with research, analysis, assessment and conservation planning at such sites as The Workhouse, Southwell; Aston Hall, Birmingham; The Royal Institution, London and Cliveden. His book on the History of Birmingham Town Hall  was published in 2012 to critical acclaim. Anthony recently introduced Stourbridge members to colonial architecture in India.

The small hill town of Urbino was a natural fortress, a fitting home for Federico da Montefeltro, perhaps the most able military strategist of the Renaissance. At the time of Federico’s death, the duke of Milan had him under contract as a condottiere (military leader) for the enormous sum of 165,000 ducats. The great warrior, however, used influence and income derived from armed conflict to transform his city into a center of humanist learning and culture. A man of great intellect and taste, he employed both Rapahel’s father and Piero della Francesca, amongst other Renaissance stars. The buildings and public spaces he gave Urbino exemplify the clarity and proportion of ancient architecture as reinvented by the Renaissance.

 Clare Ford-Wille gained an honours degree in History of Art from Birkbeck College, University of London. Now an independent art historian, she has lectured on European art, architecture and sculpture for more than thirty years. Her regular commitments include Centre for Lifelong Learning, London University, National Gallery, V&A Museum, WEA, Morley College, the City Literary Institute, the Art Fund and National Trust. 

What was the public reaction to jazz when it began to appear in Britain in the aftermath of the First World War? What did early jazz sound like and how did British musicians learn to play in the style? How did British artists and designers react to the new rhythms and colours of the music?  

Following on from The Arts Society/Two Temple Place Rhythm and Reaction exhibition, which Professor Tackley curated in 2018, this lecture explores how jazz arrived in Britain and the impact that it had on musicians, artists and the wider public. The lecture is illustrated with examples of visual art, including works not shown in the exhibition, and recorded music examples.

Professor CATHERINE TACKLEY (née Parsonage) is a musicologist specialising in jazz. She is currently Head of the Department of Music at the University of Liverpool, UK. She has written two books – 'The Evolution of Jazz in Britain: c.1880-1935' and 'Benny Goodman’s Famous 1938 Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert' - and co-edited 'Black British Jazz: Routes, Ownership and Performance'.

In 2018, Catherine curated 'Rhythm and Reaction: The Age of Jazz in Britain' for The Arts Society, an acclaimed exhibition in London based on her research. In recognition of this and her work with many other organisations, Catherine won 'Outstanding Contribution to Public Engagement' in the University of Liverpool's Staff Awards in 2019. She is Musical Director of Dr Jazz and the Cheshire Cats Big Band.

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. 

TOBY FABER is an experienced lecturer and public speaker who has been accredited by The Arts Society since 2012. His career began with Natural Sciences at Cambridge and has been through investment banking, management consulting and five years as managing director of the publishing company founded by his grandfather, Faber and Faber, where he remains on the board. He is also non-executive Chairman of its sister company, Faber Music and a director of Liverpool University Press.

Toby has written three narrative histories: 'Stradivarius – Five Violins, One Cello and a Genius'; 'Faberge’s Eggs'; and' Faber & Faber – The Untold Story', as well as a novel, 'Close to the Edge'. Of these, only the obvious one is published by the family firm.

At the end of the 17th century Poland was the largest state in Europe, but within a hundred years it had been partitioned by its powerful neighbours and partly absorbed into the Russian empire. The Poles reacted to Russia’s brutal suppression of their 1830 Uprising by developing a strong cultural identity in which artists played a key role. This lecture shows how Chopin and his revolutionary Polonaises and Mazurkas came to be seen as an indispensable symbol of the Polish nation, both during his lifetime, and in the years before Poland regained its independence in 1918.

ROSAMUND BARTLETT is a writer, lecturer and translator.  She completed her doctorate at Oxford and her work as a cultural historian ranges across the arts.  She contributes regularly to Proms events and opera broadcasts on the BBC; she has written on art, music and literature for publications such as The Daily Telegraph and Apollo, and has received commissions from institutions including the Royal Opera House, Tate UK, and the Salzburg Festival.  Her lecturing work has taken her from the V&A and the National Theatre in London to the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney. 

Rosamund is the author of several books, including biographies of Chekhov and Tolstoy, and a study of Wagner's influence in Russia. She is currently writing a history of the Russian avant-garde, and her new translation of 'Anna Karenina' for Oxford World’s Classics was published to acclaim in 2014.

Leonardo da Vinci, painter and draughtsman of the High Renaissance was an artist whose works were informed by scientific investigation. Leonardo observed the world closely describing, nature as his teacher, studying anatomy and physiology in order to create convincing images of the human form.  He understood that science was the systemic study of structure and function as representatives of human gesture and expression. Science and art are different paths that lead to the same destination.This talk reviews Leonardo’s approach to linear perspective, human proportion, emotion, light and shade together with the fashion in which his scientific investigations influenced his art.

"I come to The Arts Society not with a background in the arts but from the world of science in general, and surgery in particular," says GUY ROOKER.  "I describe myself as a retired surgeon with a lifelong passion, fascination, and admiration for the work of Leonardo da Vinci. I consider that the contribution he has made to both the world of art and the investigation of scientific concepts to be quite unique and extraordinary in the way that so many of his pioneering investigations have contributed to the understanding of our world today."

A Day of Special Interest

In 1951, up and down the country, the nation celebrated. It celebrated with events from the lavish displays on the South Bank of the Thames and at Battersea to the events held on village greens and in village halls across the land.  A nation still recovering from the physical, financial and mental struggles of the recent World War decided to hold a party for the country. This talk will consider the reasons why the Festival was held, some of the characters involved, what motivated them and the resulting events and the wonderful design, art and architecture that flourished during the Festival year.

MATTHEW DENNEY says: "I have worked with the fine and decorative arts all my life. I have worked as an auctioneer and valuer with a number of firms. I am currently a senior valuer and head of department at Lawrences in Crewkerne, one of the country's leading provincial auctioneers. I have also worked in Higher Education as Course Leader and a Senior Lecturer on the no longer extant Fine Arts Valuation Degree at Southampton Solent University. I taught on a range of subjects including furniture, silver art and design history. I completed a PhD in the Arts and Crafts Movement and have written on design history for a number of publications. I have current research interests in ‘Great Exhibitions’, ‘Post War Design and Architecture’ and ‘The Crafts in Post War Britain’. 

"I love to give talks to all sorts of different groups on the fine and decorative arts, my interests in the various Great Exhibitions since 1851 and Post War architecture and design are amongst my current favourite talks which have been well received by a number of groups over recent months."

PLEASE NOTE THAT STOURBBRIDGE TOWN HALL WILL BE CLOSED FOR MAINTENANCE ON 13 JANUARY

ROGER BUTLER'S LECTURE WILL BE GIVEN VIA ZOOM

Details will be circulated to members in January

It’s often said Birmingham has more canals than Venice and today the city’s waterways are a fascinating mixture of traditional and contemporary design, architecture and engineering. The lecture looks at the distinctive features of Birmingham’s canals and, with archival maps and images, also tells the 250-year old story of their unique industrial heritage – wharves, warehouses, locks, bridges, tunnels and, of course, boats.

ROGER BUTLER is a landscape architect and an experienced writer, photographer and lecturer. He has a particular interest in the unique history, architecture and traditions of our canal network and worked on some of the UK’s major canal restoration projects. He has also acted as a consultant to bodies such as Waterways Ireland, Natural England and the Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site.

He regularly contributes to waterway and heritage magazines and writes and provides images for a range of countryside and outdoor titles. Roger is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, a Licentiate of the Royal Photographic Society and a Chartered Member of the Landscape Institute. He lives near Stratford upon Avon and lectures to groups such as the National Trust, RSPB, U3A, history societies, etc. across the Midlands and further afield.

 Our Christmas event !

At the beginning of the twentieth century, Adolphe Valette blew into the Manchester School of Art like a breath of fresh air, inspiring his students with his French elegance and his knowledge of all the latest developments in Paris, the centre of the art world. One of those students was L S Lowry, derided by some in his lifetime as little more than a naïve Sunday painter but now widely acknowledged as a hugely significant figure in twentieth century British art. Until recently, his charismatic teacher was largely forgotten, even in the city in which he made his home for so many years, but now his achievements as both artist and teacher are finally receiving the attention they so greatly deserve. This lecture will explore the artistic journeys of the two men and the fascinating insight their works give us into life in the city. 

JULIA MARWOOD says: 'When I first saw the work of Klimt in Vienna as a young student it was love at first sight – I had never even dreamed that such beauty existed in the world.  This was just the beginning of my lifelong passion for art.  After early retirement from my career teaching German and English I now have the great pleasure of spending all day every day looking at and talking about art.  I particularly enjoy visiting galleries in Scotland to indulge my love of the Glasgow Boys, Glasgow Girls and Scottish Colourists.  As a tour guide at Manchester Art Gallery and a regular speaker to a variety of groups, I love to share the joy of looking at art.' 

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

DR CLAIRE WALSH previously worked at the Victoria & Albert Museum and lectured for the University of Warwick and now teaches at the Open University. She has lectured widely in Britain; at the Courtauld Institute of Art, Victoria & Albert Museum and Museum of London amongst others, and to specialist groups including the NACF, the Ceramics Society, the Costume Society and the Ancient Monuments Society. She has also lectured in Europe, the USA (including Yale and the Huntington) and Canada and hasnumerous publications in academic journals and edited volumes.

When social historian Tessa Boase told the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds she wanted to write their early story, they refused to let her visit their archives. To a former investigative journalist, this was a challenge she could not resist . . .

This lecture shines a light on the intriguing story of women’s love affair with plumage ­ – and of the brave eco feminists who fought back on behalf of the birds. Moving from a polite Victorian tea party to an egret hunt in a Florida swamp; from a suffragette ‘monster rally’ to a milliner’s dusty workshop, you’ll be taken back in time to a world where every woman, of every class wore a hat.

TESSA BOASE is a freelance lecturer for The Arts Society along with other organisations such as the V&A, English Heritage and the National Trust. She’s the author of two books of social history: The Housekeeper’s Tale – The Women Who Really Ran the English Country House, and Mrs Pankhurst’s Purple Feather – Fashion, Fury and Feminism, Women’s Fight for Change. Her interest lies in uncovering stories of invisible women of the Victorian and Edwardian eras, revealing how they drove industry, propped up high society and manipulated politics. Tessa has an MA in English Literature from Oxford University, a diploma in Art History from the British Institute of Florence, and has enjoyed a long career in journalism for national newspapers and magazines. 

“Antiques. I don’t understand them and they’re beyond my budget. They’re not for me.” A persuasive introduction to buying antiques and integrating and using them in today’s homes. The state of the antiques market and the different meanings of the word value are considered, and we take a look at what current and future generations of collectors are buying, why they are buying it and how they are displaying it.

MARK HILL studied History of Art & Architecture (BA Hons), and began his career as a porter and Junior Cataloguer at Bonhams, before moving to Sotheby's where he was a Specialist in the Collectors' Department. He became director of an internet company forming and running a ground-breaking deal with eBay Live Auctions.  Co-author of the internationally published Collectables Price Guide with Judith Miller from 2002-17, he founded his own publishing company in 2005 and has since published over 12 books on specialist subjects in 20th century design and decorative arts. A Miscellaneous expert on the Antiques Roadshow since 2007, Mark has co-presented three primetime factual TV series on antiques and collecting for BBC2. He is an auctioneer, running 20th century design auctions in partnership with Dawsons Auctioneers. He has lectured across the world, including at the V&A in London, and contributed to many newspapers, magazines, radio and TV programmes. Mark is Freeman of the Worshipful Company of Arts Scholarsand  a Freeman of the City of London.

The history of English garden design can be told in different ways, but rarely can it be told "through the lens" of one garden. The Oxford Botanic Garden was founded at the beginning of the 17th century and its design bears all the hallmarks of 17th century design. Through the next 400 years successive Horti Praefecti (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 - over four centuries in Oxfordshire, and how the Oxford Botanic Garden now reflects garden design at the beginning of the 21st century.  The title  refers to the fact that one of the motivations for garden design remains the desire to create paradise on Earth. The meaning of paradise may now be less rooted in the Biblical account of the rise and fall of man, but there is still a clear vision of what we would like the world to resemble.  

TIMOTHY WALKER has given 1,500 public lectures since 1986. This was originally part of his work as director of the Oxford University Botanic Garden from 1988 to 2014. Botanic gardens are often described as living museums, and garden curators lecture about them in the same way as museum curators talk about their collections. Since 2014 Timothy has been a college lecturer and tutor at Somerville College, Oxford.  Gardens are often thought of a place where science and art meet on equal terms. His lectures investigate this relationship.

Famously, every morning of his adult life, Beethoven measured out exactly 60 coffee beans for his breakfast.  A man who is capable of such discipline over a cup of coffee, can surely apply that exactness elsewhere in his life; and in Beethoven’s case, it was applied to his compositions. In fact, the detail found in his music is often so subtle, that most people don’t even know it’s there. This lecture  explores Beethoven’s genius as a writer of music, at the same time setting his extraordinary story against the backdrop of 19th century warfare, revolution and dramatic social changes. (Beethoven was 250 years old on 17 December 2020.)

PETER MEDHURST will need little introduction to many of our members.  He has visited us on several occasions, most recently for a Study Day on Vivaldi.  Peter appears in the UK and abroad as a musician and scholar, giving recitals and delivering illustrated lectures on music and the arts. He studied singing and early keyboard instruments at the Royal College of Music and at the Mozarteum in Salzburg.

NB  If we are able to use the Town Hall, our AGM will precede this lecture and will commence at 10.30 am

This lecture explores ways in which the modern treatment of traditional genres in art is different from that of the Old Masters, the effect of these differences, and whether they add to, or change, our understanding of the subject and its message. The lecture will cover all of the traditional genres, i.e. History Painting, Portraits, Genre (pictures of everyday life), Landscape and Still-Life, and will consider the ways in which the treatment of these subjects has changed over the centuries, up to the present day. 

VAL WOODGATE lectures at Tate Britain and Tate Modern, also at many other London galleries.  She was a member of the teaching team at Dulwich Picture Gallery, and also lectures and runs courses at Pallant House Gallery, Chichester.

Members may remember Val's excellent lecture on Edvard Munch, a few years ago.  In 2018 Val also gave a version of her lecture on ‘Modern Art and the Old Masters’ as a special presentation to A level Art students at King Edward’s College, Stourbridge, funded by The Arts Society Stourbridge. 

A Special Interest Course with VAL WOODGATE

 Mondays: 15th, 22nd and 29th March, 2021

 at 11.00 am, via ZOOM

It is now around 200 years since the purchase of the so-called 'Elgin Marbles' from Lord Elgin, by the British Parliament. This lecture, beautifully illustrated with specifically taken slides and video, will explore the aesthetics, the back-story, and the heated debates surrounding these fascinating and controversial works of ancient Greek art: what do we mean by 'the Elgin Marbles'? How and why were they originally created? Why are they so highly regarded? What happened to them between their creation and Elgin's time? How did he acquire them? Why are they now in the British Museum? And why are there such passionately held views both for and against their repatriation to Greece?

DR STEPHEN KERSHAW is Classics Tutor for Oxford University Department for Continuing Education and Professor of History of Art for the European Studies Program of Rhodes College and The University of the South.  He has spent much of the last 30 years travelling extensively in the world of the Greeks and Romans, both physically and intellectually. Amongst other books, he has published A Brief Guide to the Greek Myths (Robinson, 2007), A Brief Guide to Classical Civilization (Robinson, 2010) and A Brief Guide to the Roman Empire (Robinson, 2013).

Murder, poison, corruption and incest: all perfect ingredients for sensational popular culture. But in an age known for its brutality and church corruption, were the Borgias really so bad? This lecture reveals the real family that dominated the Papacy and Italian politics during the last decade of the 15th century: the charismatic figure of Pope Alexander VI, living inside his sumptuously decorated apartments, the career of his son, Cesare, cardinal, general, employer of Da Vinci and the model for Machiavelli’s The Prince, and the journey of Lucrezia Borgia from “the greatest whore in Rome” to a devout and treasured duchess of the city Ferrara. Sometimes truth is more intoxicating than myth !

SARAH DUNANT is a novelist, broadcaster and critic. Sarah read history at Cambridge, then worked for many years as a cultural journalist in radio and television on such programmes as Kaleidoscope (BBC Radio 4), The Late Show (BBC 2), and Night Waves (BBC Radio 3). She has published thirteen novels, taught renaissance studies at Washington University, St Louis, is a visiting tutor on the MA in creative writing at Oxford Brooks and has lectured around the world at festivals and conferences. Her last five novels have been set within the Italian Renaissance. Her latest, In the Name of the Family (2017) completes the story of the Borgia family and the remarkable period of Italian history in which they lived. Her recent series on history for BBC Radio 4 is called When Greeks Flew Kites.

There have been pictorial representations of The Magi from at least as early as the 6th century, and artists across the ages have been fascinated by the story and its possibilities. However, the depictions over this vast span of time have been anything but consistent.  Leslie Primo seeks to unravel the myth and the iconography behind the story of the adoration of the Magi, from its Eastern and pagan roots to its current Christian interpretation, including the issue of the black king  - where he came from, why he would be included, how significant was he and how European artists tackled the problem of depicting this magus when they themselves had little or no knowledge of people of colour.  Leslie examines the actual origins of the story of The Magi, and how much of a bearing that story has on the story as written in the Bible. 

What do we want this story to mean, and why do we hold on to the legend rather than the biblical tale ?

LESLIE PRIMO holds a BA in Art History and an MA in Renaissance Studies from Birkbeck College, University of London. He was Visiting Lecturer in Art History at the University of Reading in 2005 and 2007, and gives lectures and guided tours, plus special talks, at both the National Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery. Leslie also lectures at the City Literary Institute, and has presented a series of talks at the National Maritime Museum and the Courtauld Institute.

As we are unable to hold our usual Christmas lunch, this lecture is open to ALL our members, at no extra cost.

Please note that this lecture is on a TUESDAY !

THIS LECTURE WILL BE PRESENTED via ZOOM

Our royal families have celebrated Christmas throughout their long history, from William the Conqueror making sure of his claim to the English throne by being crowned in Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day 1066. Feasting on a spectacular scale characterised medieval Christmases – we read of extraordinary culinary delicacies served to Henry II: crane’s flesh, peacocks, herons ...  Present-giving always marked the season, from the extravagant – the City of London presented Richard II with a camel and a pelican – to the witty – Mrs. Thatcher sent the Queen a pair of yellow washing-up gloves, having seen Her Majesty doing the dishes without any. This lecture explores these traditions and other delights, many of which we have adopted as a necessary part of our own celebrations.

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

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

THIS LECTURE WILL BE PRESENTED via ZOOM

The story of how The Fan Museum came to fruition dovetails with the multifaceted history of the handheld fan. From an especially rare Elizabethan-period embroidered folding fan to contemporary examples decorated by street artists, discover some of the key objects within the Museum’s extraordinary collections, which encompass more than 5,000 fans and related objects dating from the eleventh century to the present day and gathered from most parts of the world.

JACOB MOSS completed a BA (hons) in Fashion at Reading School of Art, then took up a position as an assistant for womenswear designer Donald Campbell. In 2010 he gained a postgraduate degree (Distinction) in Fashion Curation from London College of Fashion. Shortly thereafter Jacob joined The Fan Museum, the UK’s only Museum dedicated to the history of fans and craft of fan making, which occupies a pair of early Georgian townhouses nestled in historic Greenwich.

As the Museum’s Curator, he is responsible for co-organising its temporary exhibition programme and for overseeing loans from the Museum’s extraordinary collections to organisations such as the Palace of Versailles and Metropolitan Museum of Art. In 2017 he curated ‘Street Fans’, a pioneering project linking street art and fan making which drew record audiences to The Fan Museum. 

THIS LECTURE WILL BE PRESENTED via ZOOM

2020 marks the 500th anniversary of the death of Raphael. The monumental figures and clarity of form of his art epitomise the grandeur of the High Renaissance, while his masterful drawings, in a variety of media, reflect his creative processes. His early death at the age of 37 belies the scope of his work and future influence. In this lecture, we will study his art and architecture, from his early work in Urbino and Florence to its full maturity in Rome.

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. Shirley runs study days and certificate courses as well as residential weekend courses; she also lectures to the Art Fund and individual clubs and societies. She is particularly keen to set the art and architecture of the period in the context of the society for which it was produced.

PLEASE NOTE:

THIS LECTURE WILL BE PRESENTED ONLINE, VIA ZOOM

IT WILL BE ON WEDNESDAY 17TH JUNE AT 2PM - not at our usual lecture time !

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 superstitition – are a fine narrative of Kosovo’s history and traditions.

Elizabeth Gowing studied at Magdalen College Oxford before training as a teacher and working in Lambeth, Hackney and Islington. She moved to Kosovo in 2006 and is the author of four books about Kosovo – Travels in Blood and Honey; becoming a beekeeper in Kosovo (2011), Edith and I; on the trail of an Edwardian traveller in Kosovo (2013); The Rubbish-Picker’s Wife; an unlikely friendship in Kosovo (2015) and The Silver Thread; a journey through Balkan craftmanship (2017).

Elizabeth is a regular contributor to Radio 4 (Saturday Live, Excess Baggage, From Our Own Correspondent) and the BBC World Service.

‘Lawrence of Arabia’ is an early 20th century instance of celebrity culture.  But is the Lawrence legend merely a myth - was he, as some claim, no more than a liar and a charlatan?   Or does the legend reflect reality? Was he, in fact, a brilliant military commander and a sincere advocate of the Arab national cause?

On the basis of sensational new evidence from archaeological fieldwork, this lecture will contrast the legend of Lawrence of Arabia with the true story of what happened in the famous desert war of 1916 to 1918. We will analyse the invention and re-invention of the legend from 1919 onwards through memoirs, photos, films, paintings, biographies, and documentaries. We will then contrast the legend with the biography of the man himself, focusing on key aspects of his early years and his character, and using archaeology as the basis for a detailed examination of the role which made him famous – his participation in the Arab Revolt of 1916 to 1918.

Dr Neil Faulkner was educated at King's College Cambridge and Institute of Archaeology UCL.   He works as lecturer, writer, archaeologist and occasional broadcaster.  A Research Fellow at the University of Bristol, he is also  Editor of  Military History Monthly,  Director of the  Sedgeford Historical and Archaeological Research Project, and Director of the ‘Great Arab Revolt’ Project.   Neil has written a number of books, and his TV appearances include Channel 4's Time Team, BBC2's Timewatch, Channel Five's Boudica Revealed and Sky Atlantic's The British.

This lecture features details of notable and little seen works by Stanhope Forbes and his contemporaries in the late 19th century Newlyn painting colony, drawing on private collections as well as more familiar works from gallery collections both near and far.

Recent cleaning and conservation work has shown that many Newlyn School paintings are riddled with drying cracks.  Yet little technical examination or scientific analysis has been carried out to address the questions raised by such technical discoveries.  Working from her own research and conservation records, Sarah Cove will reveal the secrets of the Newlyn painters’ methods as viewed under the microscope, and will ask as many questions as she answers.   Her lecture is illustrated with unique close-up macro-photos and the use of scientific methods such as x-radiography and infra-red reflectography.

Sarah Cove ACR is an accredited paintings conservator-restorer, technical art historian and lecturer with more than 35 years’ experience working on paintings for the heritage and private sectors. She is based in London and Falmouth and specialises in British portraits, 19th-20th century British landscapes and oil sketches on paper and board. In 1986 she founded the Constable Research Project and she is now the leading authority on Constable’s materials and techniques. She has appeared in several TV programmes for the BBC, notably Constable in Love with Andrew Graham-Dixon and Fake or Fortune? (twice) where she was instrumental in the discovery of 3 ‘lost’ Constables.  

Think of St Pancras International or New York Grand Central and you think of special places that promise excitement, adventure and long romantic journeys.  And there are dozens of other glorious stations, in the UK and abroad !  In this lecture, we take a journey around some of the world's most evocative and splendid stations, exploring the magnificence of their architecture and the brilliance of their engineering.  We also discover numerous artworks within the stations and examine the many depictions of stations in art – like Claude Monet’s Gare St Lazare or William Powell Frith’s Paddington. 

It might all sound a bit ‘anoraky’, but it’s definitely not !  It’s lavish, colourful and fun.

Many members will remember Ian Swankie from his Special Interest Day (and guided tour) a few years ago, on ‘Treasures of the Square Mile’.  Ian is a Londoner with a passion for art and architecture, and is an official guide at Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Guildhall Art Gallery and St Paul’s Cathedral, giving tours around each venue. He is also a qualified and active freelance London guide, leading regular tours for various corporations and organisations, and is a Freeman of the Worshipful Company of Art Scholars, one of the City livery companies.

This is the story of the epic rivalry between the two giants of British art, J.M.W. Turner and John Constable.  As unlike in their background and temperament as their paintings were in style, these two creative geniuses transformed the art of landscape. This lecture sets them head-to-head and examines their differences, their similarities, their battles and their shared triumphs. But who will ultimately be crowned star painter? 

As well as giving an overview of Turner and Constable, this topic provides an enjoyable overview of the British art world during the nineteenth century. 

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. Formerly a curator at Tate Britain, she has curated a number of exhibitions and has published widely on J.M.W. Turner, including contributions to the forthcoming online catalogue of the Turner Bequest. She is also co-editor and author of How to Paint Like Turner (Tate Publishing, 2010). In addition, Nicola has published on Walter Richard Sickert and is co-author of Tate's catalogue of works by the Camden Town Group.

This lecture traces the life, passions and artistic development of the well-loved cartoonist, Thelwell, from his early years and formative wartime experiences through his subsequent rise to become one of the nation’s favourites.  A fine draughtsman, Thelwell's style was realistic, with great attention paid to detail. He placed his cartoon figures in naturalistic settings, and was particularly well-known for his cartoons on fishing, sailing, motoring and English country life.  He is probably best-known for those featuring young girls and ponies, although Thelwell claimed only to have ridden once in his life and to dislike horses - "great windy things that'll grab your coat off your back as soon as look at you". Thelwell was an early campaigner for the environment, creating many cartoons about factory farming, pollution and the destruction of natural habitats.

Tim Craven studied Fine Art at Stourbridge College of Art and the Conservation of Easel Paintings at Gateshead Technical College. He joined the staff at Southampton City Art Gallery in 1980, working initially in conservation and collection management. The Gallery is famed internationally for its British 20th century and contemporary fine art holdings and is one of the finest British regional art galleries. As Curator of the Gallery from 2002-8, and Curator of Art 2008 – 17, Tim Craven added substantially to the collection and curated/co-curated many exhibitions of British historic and contemporary art. Having always continued to paint, he decided in 2008 to concentrate on his own art practice and after various solo and joint exhibitions, he founded The Arborealists in 2013. The Arborealists are a group of some 60 professional artists from all over the UK, of diverse art practice who are united by the subject of the tree. To date the group has staged 12 exhibitions in the UK and France. Tim was elected a member of The London Group in 2015 and serves on the Working Committee.

The High Renaissance saw the seamless integration of art and architecture, the pinnacle of a tradition extending back thousands of years. So how was it that by the mid-20th century, mainstream Modernist architects saw painting and sculpture as anathema to their designs?  This lecture tells the fascinating story of how painting and architecture went their separate ways, exploring the complex reasons behind their dramatic divorce, including:

• the “special status” of painting as the heralded product of artistic genius
• a change in the form and function of the picture frame
• the emergence of the commercial art market
• the rise of the public “art exhibition”

Embracing the likes of Michelangelo, Watteau, Whistler and Matisse, this broad-ranging survey culminates with the Bauhaus and its legacy in the USA – and ends by asking whether the partnership between art and architecture might be revived in the 21st Century.

Richard Whincop is a professional artist.  He graduated in English and Art History from York University in 1986, and from 1988-1994 he lectured at the adult education departments of Glasgow and Strathclyde Universities.  He then went on to become a full-time figurative artist, executing large-scale public commissions, and exhibiting widely throughout the UK. Richard now lives and works in Chichester, West Sussex.

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

Alexandra Epps has a BA from St Martin’s School of Art and an MA from London College of Printing.   Her background is in design, having practised as a graphic designer and run her own design consultancy for many years.  Alexandra is also an official Guide and Lecturer at Tate Modern, Tate Britain and Guildhall Art Gallery.  She lectures at Pallant House Gallery and is Art History Tutor at the City Lit Institute.  A  Qualified Guide to the City of London, Alexandra offers lectures and walks about many aspects of the arts for societies, corporations and private individuals.  She is co-author of the book Lord Mayor's Portraits 1983-2014.

In June 1520, Henry VIII and Francis 1 met to ratify an Anglo-French alliance and celebrate the betrothal of Henry’s daughter Mary to the Dauphin.  Next year, 2020, will see the 500th Anniversary of this extraordinary event.

The two handsome ‘Renaissance Princes’ were in their 20s, with similar reputations in military prowess, in sport and as patrons of the arts.  Both had imperial ambitions and were eager to display themselves as magnificent noblemen and warrior kings.  Each brought with him an entourage of 6,000 to a field south of Calais, for 18 days of events and entertainments designed to display the skill and splendour of each King and country.  

The logistics of transporting, accommodating, ordering, feeding, watering, protecting and entertaining the English contingent for this spectacular event are staggering.  The supply chain, often through the City of London Guilds, is equally fascinating: 3,217 horses shipped across the ‘Narrow Sea’ to Calais; a vast quantity of wood sourced from Flanders and floated along the coast; a huge temporary palace built on stone foundations with brick and timber-framed walls reaching to 40 feet.  Royal palaces were virtually emptied of their silver, gold, tapestries and furniture to decorate the temporary palace, other principal tents and a chapel (complete with an organ); gold and silver cloth, velvet and sables, jewels and pearls were imported to ‘dress and impress’.

How was it all achieved?

Jo 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. 

Jo trained in wood graining, marbling, gilding, specialist paint finishes and interior design and was awarded the City & Guilds Silver Medal for Excellence in 2000.  She taught in further education for 8 years on Art & Design National Diploma and Foundation courses then up-skilled at Central St Martin's College of Art & Design developing her own practice. She now divides her time as a designer/maker, lecturer and tutor running workshops for specialist groups.

The great composer Franz Schubert (1797-1838) surrounded himself with a brilliant circle of artists, poets, and musicians, whose talents and kindness fed his Romantic creativity. This presentation tells the fascinating story of how Schubert rewarded his friends with gifts of his ‘divine music’. Celebrated images of Schubert – in concert, playing comic charades, or travelling by horse-drawn carriage across Austria - are illustrated by Dr Griffiths at the piano via musical ‘postcards’ which immortalize the names of Schubert’s devoted companions, including the sweet Kupelwieser Waltz (written as a wedding present) or the amusing Hüttenbrenner Variations. Dr Griffiths offers invariably helpful explanations, delivered in his inimitable style from the keyboard. To conclude, a performance of Impromptus (1828): masterpieces of great lyrical beauty and power which bring the presentation to a rousing finale.

Dr Graham Griffiths is a lecturer, conductor, pianist and composer.  He has a BMusHons  from Edinburgh, a DPhil from Oxford, and is Music Research Fellow at City University of London.  He is Musical Director of Grupo Novo Horizonte de Sao Paulo (featured on BBCR3) and has made recordings of Latin American Sacred Music and Brazilian contemporary music.  He has composed music for film, and his work has been featured by public service broadcasters in several countries.

Graham Griffiths gives lectures and concerts in the UK and around the world, including Denmark, Brazil and Russia.  He has written and edited works on Stravinsky, and has made guest appearances at the St Petersburg International Conservatoires Festival, performing lost works by the Russian pianist and Romantic composer Leokadiya Kashperova, who was Stravinsky’s piano teacher.  Dr Griffiths’ research on Kashperova featured in the BBCRadio3/AHRC celebration Five Forgotten Female Composers on International Women’s Day in 2018.

Alfred Hitchcock was a film director and the ‘master of darkness’. Beginning in the ‘silent’ era, he made over fifty feature films, in which we often see innocent people caught up in circumstances beyond their control. After moving to Hollywood, ‘Hitch’ created several masterpieces of cinema, including Vertigo  (1958) and  Psycho  (1960).  Although he is often regarded simply as a skilled entertainer, the French ‘New Wave’ critics argued that Hitchcock’s films should be regarded as artistic masterworks. He remains by far the most studied film director of all time.   His London based dramas, Blackmail (1929) and Dial M for Murder (1954) will be closely analysed.

John Francis is an inspirational speaker who has delivered lecturers, workshops in the US (Texas, California, Massachusetts), Beijing, Malaysia and the UK. Initially trained as a painter, John was awarded the Max Beckmann Memorial Scholarship in painting in Brooklyn, New York and went on to be artist in resident for the state of Texas.

Later in his career John produced and directed several short films and animations. He has taught film, art and pedagogy at the University of Exeter, Arts University Bournemouth, University Sains Malaysia, Southwestern College, California, Brunel University, London and recently Kingston University.

Watercolourist, muralist, ceramicist and wood-engraver, Eric Ravilious was one of the most distinctive young British artists working between the two World Wars; he is also an artist who is of increasing interest and popularity, as recent exhibitions and sales of his work have revealed. This lecture explores Ravilious’s career, looking both at his place in the long tradition of watercolour painting in England, as well as within the social and cultural context of England in the 1920s and ‘30s, leading up to his untimely death as an official war artist in Iceland in 1942

Dr David Haycock read Modern History at the University of Oxford, and has an MA in the History of Art and a PhD in British History. He is the author of a number of books, including Paul Nash (2002) and A Crisis of Brilliance: Five Young British Artists and the Great War (2009); he has lectured widely at galleries and museums in the UK, including Tate Britain, the National Portrait Gallery, the Royal Watercolour Society and Pallant House. He was formerly a Research Fellow at Wolfson College, Oxford, and at UCLA, and was Curator of Maritime and Imperial History at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich. He is now a freelance writer and lecturer

Vermeer and his contemporaries celebrated the importance of the Dutch household, and women’s role within it.

Dutch seventeenth century interiors almost always include images of women, or remind us of their presence - at work, at leisure or parenting. Dutch painters depicted with great sensitivity this mysterious domestic realm, often inhabited only by women and children.  

Alice Foster traces the variety of subject matter, and reveals the modernity of a new nation in seventeenth century Holland.

Alice Foster has lectured for Oxford University Department of Continuing Education since 1998. She lectures regularly at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, and at the Oxfordshire Museum in Woodstock. Her busy freelance career includes organising History of Art study days with colleagues, and regular weekly classes in Oxfordshire and Worcestershire. In 2004 Alice joined The Arts Society and has lectured in Britain and in Europe. Since 2003 Alice has been a tutor on study holidays. In 2010 she was elected President of Banbury Fine Arts Society.

To mark the centenary of the First World War, many local communities have been working to renovate their war memorials, and to recover the stories of the men whose lives and deaths they record.  But the names and the lives of the sculptors and the craftsmen who created those memorials are still mostly unknown or forgotten. 

One such craftsman was William Storr Barber.  Before the war, he ran a successful stonemasonry business in Leominster and was building himself something of a reputation as a sculptor.  By the time the war ended, his work was given over almost entirely to the creation of war memorials.   How did this come about, and what was the effect on Storr Barber’s career ?

Storr Barber’s life and work are largely undocumented.  Paul’s research brings the sculptor back to life and also sheds light on some of the myriad stories that war memorials tell.

Dr Paul Norgate was educated at Wolverhampton Grammar School.  He studied at Trinity College, Cambridge, at Merton College, Oxford, and later at the University of Birmingham, where he wrote his PhD thesis on the poetry of Wilfred Owen.  After teaching for over 25 years in secondary and higher education, both in this country and abroad, Paul was latterly Chair of Examiners for Cambridge University Examinations Syndicate.   He is Associate Lecturer at Cambridge University Institute of Continuing Education. 

Now retired, Paul lives in Wolverley and is a member of The Arts Society Stourbridge.  He has published numerous articles (mostly on Wilfred Owen) and gives lectures and talks on First World War topics to a wide range of audiences.  His research into the work of William Storr Barber is a recent interest, prompted by a chance encounter with one of WSB’s memorials while searching for a tearoom in the depths of Herefordshire.

The cartoonist Carl Giles once said that he loved his creation, Grandma Giles – that fearsome, black-clad, gambling, drinking battle-axe – 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’.

Barry Venning is an historian of British art with a particular interest in the work of JMW Turner, on whom he has published widely, including the volume on Turner in Phaidon's Art & Ideas series, and several catalogue essays for exhibitions in the UK, Germany, Italy and Poland. He was the BBC's script consultant on Turner's Fighting Temeraire and has recently taken part (2013) in a BBC documentary called The Genius of Turner: Painting the Industrial Revolution. He has also published a study of John Constable's paintings. His interests and his teaching extend from medieval architecture to contemporary British art. He is currently Associate Lecturer with the Open University and lecturing on a freelance basis for The Arts Society, Christie's Education and other organisations.

As his work makes abundantly clear, Marc Chagall (1887-1985) remained deeply loyal to his humble Russian-Jewish origins. Yet he also wished his art to have a universal appeal – which, judging by its popularity, it undoubtedly achieved. This lecture will trace his long, chequered and colourful career, giving particular emphasis to the creative tensions produced by the very different cultural and artistic environments in which he found himself: starting with his hometown of Vitebsk (up to 1906), then St. Petersburg (1906-10), Paris (1910-14), Revolutionary Russia (1914-22), Berlin (1922-3), Paris (again, 1923-40), America during World War Two, and back to France in 1948.

Monica Bohm-Duchen is a London-based freelance lecturer, writer and exhibition organizer. Associate Lecturer at Birkbeck College since 2005, she has led many tours and has lectured for Tate, the National Gallery, the Royal Academy of Arts, the Open University, Sotheby's Institute of Art and the Courtauld Institute of Art.. Her publications include Understanding Modern Art (1991), The Nude (1992), Chagall (1998/2001), The Private Life of a Masterpiece (2001) and The Art and Life of Josef Herman (2009). Her book on Art and the Second World War was published by Lund Humphries in October 2013.

Nigel Arch retired from his post as Director of The State Apartments at Kensington Palace in April 2012, having worked initially at the palace as Curator of the Royal Ceremonial Dress Collection. Before that he was Head of the Department of Art at the National Army Museum and Keeper of Military History at the Castle Museum York. He has lectured in this country and the USA and his most recent publications include the essay on uniforms for the West Europe volume of the Berg Encyclopaedia of World Dress. He was appointed LVO (Lieutenant of the Royal Victorian Order) in 2008.

Our lecture title recalls Queen Charlotte’s fondness for Kew, perhaps the smallest of royal palaces. The palace offered a private retreat for the queen, as consort to George III, and for her daughters.  Kew has a rich architectural history, antedating the king’s reign, having originally been built as a fashionable house by a Huguenot merchant. The royal narrative of the palace begins with Queen Caroline, wife of George II. Her achievements and those of her eldest son Frederick Prince of Wales are discussed in the context of the palace and the gardens. The palace as now presented largely reflects the occupation of George III and his family. The latter years of the king’s reign, blighted by his illness, impacted on the building, threatening its survival. 

An independent art historian with a BA in History from UCL (1980), an MA in Early Sienese Painting (1997) and a PhD in History of Art from the Courtauld Institute of Art (2001), Janet Robson has over a decade of lecturing and teaching experience, including summer schools and public programmes, for the Courtauld, Birkbeck (University of London) and Christie's Education, as well as private study groups. She has published extensively on thirteenth and fourteenth-century Italian art. The Making of Assisi: the Pope, the Franciscans and the Painting of the Basilica, her book on the frescoes of the Upper Church of San Francesco in Assisi (co-written with Donal Cooper), was published in August 2013 by Yale University Press. She has also published numerous book chapters, essays and articles in journals including the Burlington Magazine, Apollo and Art Bulletin. She has travelled and studied extensively in Italy, having held research fellowships at the British School at Rome and at Villa I Tatti (Harvard University) in Florence, and now divides her time between Assisi and London.

Giotto di Bondone (c.1266-1337) was probably the first Italian artist to be a celebrity in his own lifetime. He was sought after by the most powerful men in Italy, from kings and popes to Franciscan friars and rich merchant bankers. According to the legend, which was largely the creation of Giorgio Vasari in the sixteenth century, Giotto was a boy wonder: his talent was spotted by Cimabue, who saw the country lad drawing a sheep on a rock. Anecdotes about Giotto’s wit abound. When asked why his children were so ugly, he supposedly retorted, “Because I made them in the dark!”  Establishing the truth about Giotto is surprisingly difficult. For an artist who is so famous he remains quite elusive. Some of the works of Giotto that Vasari admired are now agreed not to have been his. The authorship of the St. Francis cycle in Assisi is deeply controversial. On the other hand, the Arena Chapel frescoes in Padua, for which Giotto is probably best known today, weren’t even mentioned by Vasari. This lecture separates the legend from the reality, exploring the life and career of Giotto to discover the defining qualities of his work, and why he is so important in the history of western art. 

Martin Lloyd has lectured to various groups, including U3A, The National Trust, historical societies, Gresham College and business groups, since 2008. He previously worked for HM Immigration Service, and has broadcast on local and national television and radio.

From the wax seal to the microchip, man has exploited the skill of the artist and artisan in his attempt to manufacture and unforgettable document. Taking you through three centuries of passport design, this lecture explains the overt and uncovers the covert to illustrate the defences built in to the passport and the tricks the forger uses to defeat them. You will never see your passport in the same light again!

Nicholas Merchant’s career has mirrored his abiding interest in antiques. He has worked for some of the major auction houses in London as well as running his own book business devoted to the decorative and fine arts. His particular interest is English 18th century furniture and country houses; he enjoys discussing objects, particularly in their historical context. He lectures extensively in the USA, South Africa, Europe and UK, including the V&A, as well as for the principal cruise lines. He is the Art Fund's West Yorkshire Representative. He arranges specialist short breaks for collectors and a range of prestigious clients including NADFAS societies who enjoy visiting the treasures of the UK.

The Hanseatic League was established sometime in the early Middle Ages, to promote trade, and was based primarily around the Baltic with its centre in Lűbeck. Bearing in mind that national boundaries at this time were ill-defined, the gradual rise in influence of this organisation far exceeded the parameters of a mere trading organisation. This wide geographical presence of the League had political and military ramifications, but for our purposes it was the artistic ideas which it helped to disseminate throughout Europe, as far south as the Iberian Peninsula, and as far north as Bergen, which will command our attention.

Unfortunately, our scheduled lecturer, Louise Schofield is unable to be with us.  However, we have secured the services of George Hart, to talk on a similar topic.  

George Hart was Staff Lecturer at the British Museum, 1973-2004, particularly on the Ancient Egyptian and Greek collections. Now a freelance lecturer and author, he has wide experience of presenting talks and study-days to a variety of audiences. Author of books on Egyptian monuments and religion, he is a frequent Guest Lecturer on Mediterranean cruises. George has been Chairman of the Friends of the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology for 12 years, from its foundation, and is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Egypt Exploration Society. 

James Russell studied History at Pembroke College, Cambridge, but was galvanized into writing about art by a lengthy stint selling contemporary paintings and sculpture in Santa Fe, New Mexico. A passionate advocate of 20th century painting and design, he writes and lectures widely. His books include the popular 4-volume series Ravilious in Pictures, about British watercolourist and designer Eric Ravilious (1903-42), and other titles devoted to Paul Nash, Peggy Angus, Edward Bawden and Edward Seago.  He curated the 2015 exhibition Ravilious at Dulwich Picture Gallery and has lectured all over the country, from Rye to Glasgow and from the V&A to the Royal West of England Academy. He is the author of Edward Seago, the definitive account of the artist’s life and work, which was published by Lund Humphries in 2014, with a Foreword by HRH the Prince of Wales. 

 Like LS Lowry, oil painter and watercolourist Edward Seago (1910-74) was immensely popular but overlooked by critics; today the best of his landscapes look fantastic, while his life story is full of interest. A prolific author, he overcame childhood illness before running away with the circus. He also mixed in aristocratic circles, making friends among the Royal family; a colourful wartime career and a trip to Antarctica aboard the Royal Yacht add to this fascinating account. Seago is much loved by artists, and in this lecture we explore a number of his finest oil paintings and watercolours in detail, looking at his choice of subject, design and technique. 

Garden historian, author, researcher and lecturer, Twigs Way presented Lost Gardens for Channel 4 and has appeared on Gardeners' World as well as making media appearances on a wide range of garden history related topics. She carries out freelance research in the history of specific gardens and parks for bodies such as English Heritage, the National Trust and various private clients, and has a specific interest in the portrayal of plants and gardens in art and literature and the social aspects of garden history. Her publications include A History of Women in the Garden, the highly illustrated A Nation of Gardeners, and a short biography of Gertrude Jekyll, as well as the quirky History of Garden Gnomes! She is currently working on the eighteenth century diaries of the Marchioness Grey of Wrest Park and is also involved in the 2016 tercentenary celebrations of one of our greatest landscape designers, Lancelot 'Capability' Brown.

An accomplished botanical painter and inveterate traveller, Marianne North (1830-1890) led an unconventional life capturing the essence of rare plants. Born in Hastings, the daughter of an MP, she initially contented herself with the wild flowers of England, but after the death of first her mother and then her father her pursuit of plants took her round the world. Japan, Java, Ceylon, Canada, India, Brazil and Jamaica were just some of the countries she penetrated into the remote regions in search of rarities, discovering and being honoured with the naming of such plants as Crinum northianum and Nepenthes northiana. This talk will explore both the life and social context of Marianne North, including an examination of why her paintings troubled deeply conservative Victorian society and the eventual creation of her gallery.

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

Sarah says: "A glimpse into the artistic ferment of pre ­First World War Vienna, this lecture is outside my  normal remit - but my colleague, Margaret Stonborough, happens to be a Wittgenstein and  inherited her father’s family archives !   We are still going through the tea chests, but have already discovered a wealth of unpublished material that sheds light on the philosopher, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and his extraordinary siblings:  Margaret (Gretl), painted by Klimt,  patron and collector extraordinaire of Vienna Secession art works; Paul lost his right  arm in WWI, but continued his career as a concert pianist by commissioning works for the left  hand from Ravel, Prokofiev and many others;  and Hermine (Mining), the draughtsman and the  chronicler of the family fortunes.  This lecture is done as a double­hander, as Margaret knew many of her formidable relatives and is able to give a uniquely Wittgenstein take on her  family."

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

Flying Scotsmen, Golden Arrows, Belles and Pullmans; no wonder Betjeman still stands in awe at St Pancras ! Covering the Golden Age of British Railways - the era of the 'Big Four', 1923-1947 -  this lecture celebrates the most romantic period of our British travel history. You’ll see how the best travel posters connect with your heart and your mind, and how they have closely reflected the evolution of British holidays.

Dr Sally Hoban is an Honorary Research Fellow at The University of Birmingham and has lectured extensively on art, design and antiques throughout the UK. Sally has broadcast on BBC Two, BBC Four and BBC Radio 4 and her publications include Miller’s Collecting Modern Design. She has an Honours certificate in public speaking from The London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, and is a freelance arts journalist for local, national and international media. Sally has a PhD in the history of art and design from The University of Birmingham.

Many people are familiar with the national designers of the 19th century Arts and Crafts Movement such as William Morris and Charles Ashbee. But the Midlands made a huge contribution to the movement as well. Designers at The Bromsgrove Guild of Handicrafts for example produced the exquisite wrought iron gates for Buckingham Palace. This lecture sets the work of these Midlands designers in the context of the national Arts and Crafts Movement using examples of jewellery made by Arthur and Georgina Gaskin, stained glass by Florence Camm, ceramics from the Ruskin Pottery and more. It also reveals the best locations in the region to see examples of local Arts and Crafts Movement design.

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.  A part-time lecturer for the University of East Anglia and for the Department of Continuing Education of the University of Cambridge, she has run study days and certificate courses, as well as residential weekend courses.  Shirley also lectures to the Art Fund and individual clubs and societies, and is particularly keen to set the art and architecture of the period in the context of the society for which it was produced.

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: his uncontrollable temper 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.

Anton Gabszewicz is former Director and Head of European Ceramics at Christie's, London, and course organiser for Christie's Education. An International specialist in English and European Ceramics for over 40 years, he appeared on the very first BBC Antiques Roadshow and broadcast with them for over a decade. He has published several books and articles on English Porcelain, and is an internationally respected authority, especially on Bow Porcelain. Anton lectures extensively in Britain, the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. He regularly writes for and lectures at the International Ceramics Fair & Seminar in London.

This presentation will address the marked differences between two important contemporary porcelain factories. The two founders, Nicholas Sprimont and Thomas Frye, both working within easy reach of the City of London and the Thames, no doubt had many friends and interests in common. They had both left their former professions, silversmith and portrait painter, to become pioneers in the risky new venture of porcelain manufacture. This lecture follows the factories’ development against the background of London in the mid-18th century. The products of both concerns are discussed in tandem, which allows for differences and similarities to be emphasised. In this way the strengths and weaknesses of each factory and their commercial acumen become apparent.

James Bolton is a graduate of the Inchbald School of Design (1990; Dip ISD) and has been Faculty Director, Design History, there. He was Head Gardener at the Old Rectory, Farnborough (1990-92) and since 1992 has been a Garden Designer. His 'Garden Mania', a book on garden ornaments, was published in 2000.

Joseph Paxton was the ultimate Victorian example of rags to riches; he was the child of a Bedfordshire farm labourer and through a combination of good fortune, immense natural talent and sheer hard work, he rocketed through nineteenth century English society to become MP for Coventry, director of several railway companies, creator of The Crystal Palace, knight and, most significantly, boon companion of the Duke of Devonshire. We explore Paxton as architect and gardener, at Chatsworth, where he worked for thirty-two years, as well as projects in England, Ireland and France, culminating in the triumph of The Crystal Palace itself.

Peter 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.

It was largely due to the impact of the Napoleonic wars that Germany finally established an artistic and cultural identity and became one of the leading figures in the early 19C Romantic Movement. Peter explores the effects that the Napoleonic Wars had on writers, artists and musicians, including Goethe, Friedrich, Weber and Mendelssohn. The lecture is illustrated with digital images and examples sung and played at the piano.

Ann Haworth is a lecturer at the V&A, and Guide for private tours of the State Rooms and The Queen's Gallery at Buckingham Palace. She lectures in British Painting for American students resident in London. In Autumn 2002, she catalogued the collection of Chinese porcelain at Kensington Palace. From 2002 to 2005, Ann was a committee member of the French Porcelain Society. From 1995 to  2002, she was resident in Shanghai, China, where she visited ancient kiln sites and lectured to expatriate groups. From 1981 to 1995, she  trained and became a senior ceramics specialist at Christie's and Bonhams head offices.

The Della Robbia family of Florence, including the sculptor Luca and his nephew, Andrea, perfected the art and craft of glazing roundels and architectural panels made of terracotta. They worked during the 15th and early 16th centuries and counted the Church and great Florentine families among their patrons. Marked out by the distinctive colours of blue, yellow, manganese and green enriched in lustrous white, these panels brought to life delicate groups of angels, the emotion between the Madonna and Child and stories from the Bible including the Adoration of the Kings. Prestigious products of this workshop can still be seen in church and cathedral interiors and on the walls of church and civic buildings in Florence and the nearby towns of Tuscany, including Pistoia and Barga. Girolamo, the son of Andrea, was commissioned by the French King Francois I to work on the Chateau de Madrid in the Bois de Boulogne. The fame of the Della Robbia family outlived their workshop and was celebrated in Victorian Britain with original examples acquired by museums such as the V&A and others reinterpreted by the Della Robbia art pottery workshop at Birkenhead.

Linda Smith holds two first-class degrees in Art History. An experienced guide and lecturer at Tate Britain, Tate Modern and the Dulwich Picture Gallery, Linda also lectures to secondary school audiences and independent arts societies.

This lecture looks at the key developments in early English painting, which in the C16th were being made largely by foreigners. Important works by artists like Holbein, Eworth and Gheeraerts are explained in detail, and close attention is paid to symbolism, both personal and political.

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 also examines the intriguing issue of naturalism, and how and why the requirement for it waxed and waned during the period. 

Dr Sarah Pearson holds a First Class BA in Art History from Reading University, an MA in World Art Studies from the University of East Anglia and a PhD in Architectural History, also from Reading. She lectured for 10 years at Reading and at the University of East Anglia, and now works as a freelance lecturer and adult education provider. Sarah has published articles and a book chapter on the architect Francesco di Giorgio and is currently researching the development of the Riddlesworth estate with a view to future publication.

Francesco di Giorgio, like Leonardo da Vinci, was a Renaissance polymath gifted in art, architecture sculpture and engineering. The two men met whilst working in Milan and Leonardo owned a copy of Francesco’s treatise on architecture and military engineering. An examination of the writings of the two men demonstrates that many of Leonardo’s famous inventions can be traced back to earlier versions in the work of Francesco. This lecture compares the work of Francesco di Giorgio and Leonardo as well as examining the Renaissance tradition of artistic and architectural writing as a way of passing on technical knowledge from artist to artist. 

Rupert Willoughby is a prize-winning historian who specialises in the domestic and social life of the past. A graduate with First Class Honours in History from the University of London, he is the author of the best-selling Life in Medieval England for Pitkin, of guides to castles owned by English Heritage and Hampshire County Council, and of a series of popular histories of places, including Chawton: Jane Austen’s Village and Basingstoke and its Contribution to World Culture. He contributes regular obituaries to The Times and The Daily Telegraph, writes privately-commissioned histories of houses, and is an experienced lecturer - and occasional broadcaster - on a broad range of topics, with a particular interest in architecture, interior decoration and costume.

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

Sally Hoban has an Art History degree from the university of Birmingham and over 20 years’ experience in the antiques trade. She lectures extensively on art, design and antiques throughout the UK and lectures at Birmingham and Aston Universities.

The Lunar Society of Birmingham, whose members included Matthew Boulton, James Watt, Erasmus Darwin, Joseph Priestly and their friend Josiah Wedgwood, were both artists and scientists and their legacy of experimentation in the late 18th and early 19th centuries helped give us the modern industrial world we know today. This lecture discusses the relationship between art and science in the Lunar Circle, with examples drawn from subjects including painting and drawing and Matthew Boulton’s silver. The lecture also discusses the virtually unknown women connected with the Lunar Circle, including Elizabeth Stockdale Wilkinson (1799 – 1871), who was involved in early photography in Birmingham, and the poet Anna Seward (1747 – 1809).

Valerie Woodgate is coming back for her third visit to Stourbridge. She is a well known lecturer at Tate Britain and Tate Modern and on cruise ships as well as other major galleries as well as on religious art in churches and cathedrals.

The Norwegian, Munch, is the most well-known and admired Scandinavian artist, some of whose works, like The Scream have become icons of the modern world. Through his expressive use of colour and line in a series of wonderful paintings, etchings and woodcuts, he explored universal themes of psychological disturbance, love and jealousy. In the words of Robert Cumming, “He made anxiety beautiful”.

Madeline Goold holds a first degree in Law from the London School of Economics, a second Fine Arts degree and M.Phil in Art History from the Barber Institute, Birmingham. She is a  sculptor  and professional print maker who exhibits widely.

A number concealed in a piano made by John Broadwood in 1807 leads to a quest to discover who had first owned and played it. The story is set against the broader history: from their beginning pianos carried the voice and values of British culture to every part of the known world. We look at pianos humble and grand in museums and private collections and, through contemporary paintings, at the people who owned them. As pianos found their way from drawing-room to parlour, from schoolhouse to public house, Indian bungalow and Caribbean Great house, did they indeed bring about a cultural revolution?

Jonathan Meyer graduated from Oxford with a degree in Theology. He has worked for Sotheby’s, Bonham’s and the Fine Art Auction Group. He has lectured worldwide and written numerous articles. He now runs his own valuation and consultancy business and works part time as an Anglican priest.

This lecture will look at ways of examining furniture considering what features one should be looking for in order to establish authenticity. In so doing it will seek to think about how furniture was made and used as both these aspects will help illuminate the way in which it should show signs of age and wear. There will the consideration of some fakes and how they might be spotted. If time is available it will also look at contemporary inventories and ways of indentifying different makers. The underlying premise being that it is impossible to understand furniture properly without having a feel for its original context, raison d’être and the way in which it was used.

Nicholas Bagshawe trained at Sotheby’s. He spent his working life as an art dealer . He currently deals by appointment  in 18th, 19th and 20th century pictures.  He regularly lecture’s at Sotheby’s institute, V&A and Tate Britain. This will be his second visit to Stourbridge.

Philip De Laszlo, who died in 1937, made a substantial reputation for himself painting the great and the good both in England and abroad. Strangely though, despite being fondly remembered by a pre-war generation, De Laszlo’s reputation today is slightly obscure. Until January 2004 with a loan show at Christie’s, no major exhibition of his work had been held since his death in the 1930’s. This lecture, illustrated with a number of his most sumptuous works, will try to assess De Laszlo’s oeuvre with an objective eye. Getting on for a century after the execution of his best work, can today’s critics justify his earlier acclaim?

Professor Binfield  is a Man of Kent, Cambridge Graduate, cruise lecturer, Professor Emeritus in History, University of Sheffield, he is a straight-up-and-down historian returning to some first and last loves- buildings their creators and their settings.

This lecture celebrates Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin (1812-1852). His work was uneven. Too much of it lacks the WOW factor. Yet his impact on the landscape, townscape, and churchscape of nineteenth-century Britain was without parallel. Some of this is attributable to his buildings, more is attributable to his writings, and much of it comes from his personality. He was in fact a genius.

Rosamund Barrett gained her doctorate from Oxford and has held senior university posts, most recently at the European University Institute in Florence. She specialises in comparative study of art, music and literature with special interest in Russian cultural history.                    

A hundred years ago, Diaghilev decided it was time to showcase Russian culture to the world fearing it was about to be swept away (as indeed happened with the 1917 Revolution), and fervently believing it had something unique to offer. Beginning with art exhibitions, he steadily became more ambitious, taking first concerts of Russian music to Paris (works which now form the standard repertoire), then operas, then ballets, using well-regarded artists as set designers. After Tchaikovsky had made it into a serious genre in its own right, Russian ballet was at its prime, with Nijinsky and Pavlova amongst its greatest stars. In 1910 began Diaghilev’s famous collaboration with Stravinsky, the enfant terrible of 20th-century music. After The Firebird came Petrushka, and then in 1913 the Parisian haute monde was shocked to its core by the epoch-making The Rite of Spring, one of the key works which catapulted Russian artists and musicians into the forefront of the European avant-garde. The Ballets Russes contributed prominently to the “Russian Renaissance” at the beginning of the 20th century, and this lecture is a celebration of the magic, creative energy and passion which lay at their heart.

Edward Saunders is a graduate of Rhodes and Oxford Universities. He worked in London for over 40 years and lectured at the University of London, Christies, the Wallace Collection  as well as leading tours in Europe for specialist companies.

In the arid hinterland of South Africa, at the confluence of the Vaal and Orange rivers, it was becoming increasingly evident by 1866 that some of the stones with which the children of the Boer farmers were playing could be diamonds. By 1869/70 the rush had begun and the town which then arose, rapidly attracting some 50,000 speculators, was named Kimberley after the then Colonial Secretary, Lord Kimberley. Of those who rose to the top, making, and sometimes losing, unbelievable fortunes in a matter of years, were an elite group of young men, mainly from Britain and Germany, who then went on to dominate the goldfields as well.

Gold was discovered on the Witwatersrand in 1886, 20 years after the first diamond finds, but whereas in Kimberley it had been relatively easy for anyone to dig into a diamondiferous pipe and find stones, to mine the thin seams of gold, often embedded deep underground, required huge capital outlay. More often than not, this capital was provided by the same men who had prospered in Kimberley and by the 1890’s they were the richest individuals in the entire British Empire. They had all risen from nowhere to make their astronomic fortunes in 20 years or less and, having done so, gravitated to London, whether they were British, German or South African, to acquire huge mansions and great collections of art, to flaunt their wealth and literally to buy their way into society

The lecture will begin with Cecil Rhodes, the greatest of the Randlords, although his imperial vision impeded him from entering the art market, but foremost among his colleagues who assembled great collections were Sir Julius Wernher and Alfred Beit. Today the Wernher collection is displayed at the Ranger’s House in Greenwich and the best of Beit’s paintings are in the National Gallery of Ireland. Amongst other collectors was Sir Max Michaelis whose collection of Dutch and Flemish paintings is now displayed in its own museum in Cape Town.

John Ericson is returning for the third time to Stourbridge      and many of you will have heard one of his lectures or attended his study day on “Wine Related Antiques”. He is popular NADFAS lecturer.

Pubs and their signs are a fundamental part of our history and cultural heritage. In this colourful and entertaining lecture John shows some of the most interesting and distinctive signs before exploring the fascinating stories behind the origin of some of their peculiar names. Who could fail to be intrigued by ‘The Bucket of Blood’, the ‘Cow and Snuffers’ or even the ‘Eager Poet’ – and who on earth was ‘Blind Jack’?

Jo Walton began teaching and lecturing after University, combining this with a career in art bookselling. She now combines freelance lecturing with work in publishing and acts as a guide for Tate Modern and Tate Britain.

A lecture that examines the ways in which the Industrial Revolution affected art and design, and how it was depicted in the paintings and objects of the late 18th and 19th centuries. In 1709, in a small riverside town in Shropshire, a Quaker industrialist called Abraham Darby set up the Coalbrookdale Iron Foundry. His revolutionary new method of smelting iron ore would make him a pioneer of the Industrial Revolution. From the beautiful Iron Bridge across the river Severn, built by his grandson in 1776, to the majesty of the Crystal Palace, opened by Queen Victoria in 1851, new forms of technology created a world of factories, railways and mass production. In this talk we'll meet inventors, industrialists and designers like Josiah Wedgwood, Matthew Boulton, Thomas Telford and the Stephensons, whose products married design and modernity and became renowned across Europe. Through the paintings of the 18th and 19th centuries, we'll see how new techniques affected design, and consider how mass production and the changing landscape affected life for rich and poor. The apogee of this industrial age was the Crystal Palace exhibition of 1851. We'll look at the building, its contents and the huge success of the Great Exhibition, as well as its legacy for art, design and architecture through the nineteenth century and beyond.

Douglas Skeggs has a degree in Fine Arts from the University of Cambridge. He is a writer with six published novels, an artist, a TV presenter, a lecturer on many London Art courses and Director of the New Academy of Arts.

Montmartre during the mid to late 19th century was often a sinister and dangerous place with its labyrinth of winding lanes and alleyways cascading down the hill with its renowned windmills. It became the places of entertainment and inspiration to many artists in the area - artists such as Renoir in the Moulin de la Galette, painting his famous crowd scenes, to Toulouse Lautrec's vibrant and evocative can-can girls and late night revellers in the Moulin Rouge.

A bookbinder, artist and teacher. He first learned bookbinding at 16 from Benedictine Monks at Douai Abbey in Berkshire and later at the London College of Printing. He has worked at the V&A, and for various binderies in London, New York and San Francisco, and spends part of the year teaching across the USA. He has his bindery in the Lake District, from where he travels across the UK teaching master classes and lecturing. He is Vice President of the Society of Bookbinders and was elected a Fellow of Designer Bookbinders in 2008. His binding work is mostly the restoration of antiquarian books and Design Bindings. He has won many prizes in the Designer Bookbinders competition, including both first prizes and the Mansfield Silver Medal in 2007. His bindings are in collections worldwide, including the British Library and the John Rylands Library in Manchester. In 2010 he bound a special copy of the winner of the Booker Prize which was presented to the author. In June 2013 he won first prize in the prestigious Sir Paul Getty International Bookbinding Competition. His winning binding was acquired by the Bodleian Library in Oxford.

The Great Omar was the most fabulous, elaborate and opulent binding ever created. It was embellished with over one thousand jewels, five thousand leather onlays and a hundred square feet of gold leaf, and took a team of craftsmen over two and a half years to make. It went down with the Titanic. This lecture tells the story of the making of the fabulous Great Omar. It is also the story of the renowned bookbinding firm of Sangorski and Sutcliffe - who were known for their elaborate jewelled bindings - and the men that made this extraordinary book. It also tells the moving story of life after the tragedy, and of one young man in particular, who decided against the odds to recreate the binding, a venture which itself is mired in tragedy and which occupied him for the rest of his life.

Denis Moriarty is a lecturer and Study Course director who spent most of his early working life as a BBC television producer. He was educated at Reading School, and after national service as an infantry officer in the Royal Berkshire regiment in Germany, read history at St John's College, Oxford. He leads cultural tours: music, English festivals, Schubertiade in Austria, Dresden, Vienna, Budapest and Prague; architecture and history, India, America, Egypt, Portugal, Malta, for private parties.

Studied at Courtauld Institute and Birkbeck College, London and regularly lectures at the Sotheby's Institute of Art. Currently managing an art recovery company and served on the Looted Art Working Group for the Holocaust Era Assets Conference in Prague, where she was instrumental in drafting the Terezin Declaration on Nazi looting, which was ratified by 46 countries. She has given talks to the Focus-Abengoa Foundation Symposium in Seville, the Courtauld Institute, the Documentation Centre of World War II Cultural Assets, Sotheby's and Microsoft. Publications include articles for The Art Newspaper, Art & Law Magazine and Art Quarterly.

Each artwork tells its own story. The Inside Stories is a 'top 10 looted art cases' lecture. I'll look at the most famous works of art that were looted by the Nazis. I will discuss their provenance and their journeys from their wartime owners to where they are now. Examples of works I’ll discuss are Vincent van Gogh’s Portrait of Dr. Gachet and Pablo Picasso’s Portrait of Angel Fernandez de Soto, which was once owned by Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Educated at New College, Oxford, and formerly 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 (including NADFAS) 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.

The great Victorian animal painter Edwin Landseer painted two portraits of an American lion tamer called Isaac Van Amburg for Queen Victoria and the Duke of Wellington. The Queen and the Duke were great admirers of Van Amburg, who was the sensation of the London stage during the earliest years of the Queen’s reign. But Landseer’s opinion was almost certainly less flattering – an attitude which (unusually for a portrait painter) he subtly expressed in his portrait for the Duke. This lecture discusses Landseer’s two extraordinary paintings, and brings in a host of interesting characters, including - as well as Queen Victoria and the Duke of Wellington - Dickens, Thackeray, the actor William Macready, and even Charles Sherwood Stratton, better known as ‘General’ Tom Thumb.

There can be few members who have not used blue and white china at some time in their lives, at a grandparent’s house or grew up with it or perhaps some of you own or collect it. You may be surprised to learn that the origin and development of cobalt blue decoration seems to have come from the Middle East in the 9th century. Cobalt blue pigments were excavated from local mines in central Iran from the 9th century and then exported as a raw material to China. The blue and white technique was fully developed in China with porcelain technology in the 14th century. To hear how it spread back to the Middle East and the influence it had on design you will need to come to Professors Allen’s lecture.

Why are hundreds of mediaeval carvings of the Virgin and Child found across Europe Black and why does the Catholic Church find them so embarrassing? Black Virgins are famous from France to Switzerland, Poland to Spain. Most seem to date from 11th to the 13th centuries and many are credited with miraculous powers. We will look at some of the legends of the miracle-working Black Virgins and try and sort the truth from the New Age myth.

Dr. Robert McManners is a practising artist and regularly holds exhibitions of his work. He gives art lectures to a variety of groups and has published articles about miners who were also artists.

David Winpenny studied English at Birmingham University and taught for several years before joining the Countryside Commission as co-ordinator of its National Parks Campaign. He has published a book about pyramids and writes regularly for the BBC Countryfile Magazine.

Lizzy Derbyshire studied for a Masters degree at the Courtauld Institute of Art. She has wide experience as a freelance lecturer in the History of Art, working with fine art societies, art festivals, art galleries and museums, both in the UK and abroad.

Helen McCabe read French at Bristol University and studied History of Art and Architecture in Paris. She has already talked to us about houses and gardens in Normandy and it is by request of members that she is returning to take us on a trip around a different part of France.

Angela Cox was Head of Education at the National Portrait Gallery 1970 -80. Since then she has lectured widely at museums and galleries. She has for many years run courses at Birkbeck College, University of London

Sue Jackson was originally in art and design publishing and now spends her time between lecturing and as a qualified Blue Badge Guide taking groups on guided walks around London.

Dr John Sankey was educated at the Universities of Cambridge and Leeds. He served in the Foreign Office from 1963-82 and was High Commissioner for Tanzania 1982-85 and Ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva from 1985 to 1990.

Peter Medhurst is returning for the second time. He is well known both in the UK and abroad as a musician and scholar, giving recitals and delivering illustrated lectures on music and the arts.

Chloe Cockerill is a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin and has a postgraduate diploma in Librarianship. She was Cambridge Citizens Advice Bureau Manager for over 20 years and since 2001 Regional Development Manager for the Churches Conservation Trust.