Roger Mendham: Doors to Manual - the evolution of flying from absolute luxury to modern day economy.  

Flying is something we take for granted these days - it is a very quick, easy and relatively economic way of travelling long distances, but in the beginning things were very different. 

The first scheduled passenger flight from the Uk was in 1919, when a two and a half hour flight would take you to Le Bourget, Paris.  The conditions and level of comfort were basic, no in-flight service and the seating was wicker chairs bolted to the floor of the cabin.

Biography:

A keen and accomplished photographer Roger has gained Distinctions from the Royal Photographic Society and has recently completed 3 years as President of the Surrey Photographic Association. His artistic taste is predominantly 20th century and he is particularly interested in the visual aspects of art. He has studied the evolution of photography from its earliest days in the early 1800s to becoming 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.

John Ericson; Norman Rockwell: Great American artist or mere illustrator?  

A celebrated and prolific twentieth century painter and illustrator whose work has probably been seen by a larger audience than any other artist in History simply because it was published.

Rockwell painted more than 50 covers for ‘The Saturday Evening Post', a hugely popular and widely distributed weekly magazine.

Norman Rockwell died in 1978 but his work still enjoys broad popular appeal and his original paintings sell for many millions of dollars.

Many of his paintings tell us whimsical stories that invariably make us smile and often referred to as: A story teller with a brush.

John Ericson was formerly a lecturer at the University of Bath where he was Director of Studies in the School of Education with responsibility for the professional development of teachers. He has worked extensively overseas as an educational consultant and this has given him the opportunity to give lectures and presentations at conferences all over the world. Over the last decade he has been a popular speaker on the Arts Society circuit in the UK and Europe as well as a frequent visitor to the societies in Australia and New Zealand. 

In his professional life he has developed a particular interest in presentation skills including the role of pictures in learning and the appropriate use of PowerPoint. This coupled with his ability to relate well to people of all ages and backgrounds makes him an impressive and confident public speaker. 

As well as the talks he has developed from his professional background, he offers presentations on an eclectic range of topics that are derived from his diverse interests and enthusiasms such as, Art Inspired by Wine, Visual Illusions in Art and The Shakers of North America. 

Imogen Corrigan;  Crowds and Clouds of Angels   

There are so many angels there could seem to be an avalanche of them. It’s unusual for there not to be an image of at least one angel, if not many in our churches and cathedrals and yet passers-by know very little about them. We hear of tens of thousands in the Bible and other early texts but a surprise is how many of their names are known to us. Where do they come from and what are they for? We can see a hierarchy in the Nine Orders of Angels but that’s rather general and was devised in the 6th Century. What about the rest of them? Are they male or female? And what do they look like?

After nearly 20 years in the British army, Imogen went to the University of Kent to study Anglo-Saxon & Medieval History and Art, graduating with 1st class honours, followed by an MPhil from the University of Birmingham. She now works as a freelance lecturer across Britain and Europe as well as lecturing on small cruise ships and running study tours and courses on land. She has written Stone on Stone: the Men Who Built the Cathedrals, published 2019. 

Alan Silman; Henri Matisse: cut up, cut down and cut outs!  

Henri Matisse ranks with Picasso as one of the real blockbuster artists of the 20th century. This lecture will focus on his health especially the  continued series of psychological and physical challenges. From early childhood he 'suffered' ill health, with what today could be referred to as neuroses. Multiple lifestyle and psychiatric interventions did little to give him peace but did not prevent him producing his magnificent series of post-impressionist works. In addition, a well-documented series of surgical mishaps, against the background of the Second World War, left him, if not bed bound, but chair bound.

Currently Alan Silman is a Professor of Medicine at Oxford University and Senior Research Fellow at Green Templeton College Oxford. Prior to this for 8 years he was Medical Director of the charity Arthritis Research UK (ARUK - now called Versus Arthritis). He is an epidemiologist with a particular interest in diseases of bones, muscles and joints.  He has authored over 700 research publications and a number of textbooks.  He is amongst the top 100 published scientists across all disciplines in UK universities.

He has been an advisor on several government committees including chairing the Appeals Panel for NICE, which sits when there is an appeal if NICE had rejected the use of a drug for the NHS. He has also appeared before a number of UK Parliamentary Select Committees.

In his role at ARUK he was responsible, not only for the charity’s research portfolio, but to be ‘the voice’ to both the general public as well as all broadcast and print media on matters related to arthritis.  He has received substantial media training in that role.

Jeremy Mainwaring-Burton;  The Queen Mother at the Castle of Mey  

The Castle of Mey was the only property the Queen Mother ever owned and she would spend every August there surrounded by members of her Household and staff, and a number of guests. Jeremy first stayed there in the late 1970s while serving as Her Majesty’s equerry and on many occasions thereafter as one of her guests.  

This presentation is based on personal experience and cannot be described as an academic study. Nevertheless, it is a fascinating account of what it was like to stay at the Castle of Mey, not just for those of us lucky enough to be invited as guests but also for our royal hostess.  

On leaving Durham University with a degree in geology Jeremy decided to join the army. He then spent five years in the Irish Guards, the last two and a half of which were on secondment to Clarence House as the Queen Mother’s equerry. Being a geologist he couldn’t help but notice the magnificent gemstones in the Queen Mother’s jewellery.  This inspired him to study gemmology and on leaving the army he qualified as a Fellow of the Gemmological Association. Then, in addition to working as an exploration geologist in South Africa and a gold miner in California, he spent several years as a jewellery and precious stone dealer in London’s Hatton Garden. When the Queen Mother died in 2002 he helped open the Castle of Mey to the public and what was supposed to be a six-week appointment turned into six years. As a result he spent more time at the Castle of Mey than its royal owner ever did, and developed it as one of northern Scotland’s most popular visitor attractions.

Aaron Hunter;  London City of Scientific Discovery 

We will explore the history and architecture of London’s University quarter, Bloomsbury where I will reveal some of the significant scientific discoveries that have taken place here. From the first steam engines to a jar of moles and the Blaschka glass collection at London's Grant Museum of Zoology, and from Benzene Rings to strange inflammable air and the first the anaesthetic. We will discover the history and architecture of the University of London Colleges and institutes. Including Birkbeck College, Senate House and the original University of London - University College London, still home to the preserved remains of its spiritual founder Jeremy Bentham.

Aaron is a professional scientist and researcher with the University of Cambridge and a prize-winning London Blue Badge Guide, a Green Badge Guide for the City of London and Oxford, and a City of Bath Mayor's Guide. 

Rupert Dickens:  Arcimboldo at the Court of the Alchemists  

2027 is the 500th anniversary the birth of Giuseppe Arcimboldo, one of the strangest and most intriguing artists of all time. He captivated his contemporaries with his depictions of the human face composed of objects such as fruits, flowers, fish and books. After centuries of obscurity, he was rediscovered in the 19th century and then revered by the Surrealists who saw him as a pioneer for their mining of the subconscious. Arcimboldo worked at the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II, one of the greatest collectors in history who acquired masterpieces by Bruegel, Titian and Durer. He also assembled hundreds of artists, wizards and alchemists at his castle in Prague.

Rupert is an art historian based in south London with a special interest in Dutch and Flemish 16th and 17th century painting. He works at the Wallace Collection as a guide conducting public and private tours and lecturing on aspects of the collection. Rupert has accompanied groups on art-themed tours to the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Austria and Italy. He has lectured to large audiences on subjects as diverse as the game of chess in art and Madame de Pompadour’s artistic patronage in 18th century France. He studied art history at Birkbeck College before undertaking a Masters in Dutch Golden Age Studies at University College London. Before that Rupert had a 26-year career as a BBC journalist ending as an editor in radio news. 

 Christmas in Bach’s Leipzig: the Christmas Oratorio of 1734/5 (S)

Sandy Burnett’s close relationship with Bach’s music stretches back for decades; between 1997 and 2010 he directed a complete cycle of Bach’s sacred cantatas in West London.

In this illustrated talk he explores how Bach brings the Christmas story alive in his Weihnachtsoratorium or Christmas Oratorio, written for Lutheran congregations in 1730s Leipzig.

An overview of Bach’s life and achievement precedes a close look at this magnificent work which draws on various forms ranging from recitative, arioso, aria, chorale, and instrumental sinfonia through to full-blown choruses which are infused with the joyous spirit of the dance.

RESURGAM- the Music of St Paul's Cathedral

The last time St Paul’s Cathedral was deprived of music for a long period was after the devastating Fire of London in 1666.  In 1697 Christopher Wren was able to triumphantly declare RESURGAM as the phoenix rose from the ashes.

 Patrick will look at music from either side of this momentous event. He will also guide us through the finest repertoire from across the Cathedral’s liturgical year. Escorted by a selection of his favourite photographs,  music and videos he will aim to convey the glories of twenty-five years of singing in this extraordinary building. 

Shakespeare's Monarchs: Power or Progress?

Are Shakespeare’s depictions of English kings all variations on the same theme of a battle for the crown, or do they in some sense progress?

Using images, quotations and thematic diagrams, this lecture shows first how the eight core  history plays join up into a continuous story. We will then look at the way the focus moves from battles and revenge, triumph and defeat, to questioning of the justification and accountability of power by looking at them in the order in which they were written. 

Banksy: Fraud or Genius

The lecture will trace the story of Banksy’s humble beginnings as a tagger on the streets of Bristol in the 1980’s to one of the most recognisable names in the art world.

We will examine the reasons behind his incredible rise, looking at some of his famous stunts and discuss what his influence has been on the art market today and look at what his legacy, if any, might be. 

Catherine The Great: the World's Greatest Collector

In 1745, a Princess from the minor province of Anhalt-Zerbst in Saxony, married Prince Karl Peter Ulrich of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf, heir to the Imperial Russian Throne. She was Princess Sophie Auguste Frederike and by 1762 she had deposed her, was crowned Empress Catherine II and became the sole ruler of the Russian Empire.

Pop-Up Pyramids & Lift-the-Flap Anatomy: The Pleasures of Print in Early Modern Europe

n this lecture we'll consider the incredible array of interactive prints produced in sixteenth-century Europe, from the original 'pop-up body book' to lift-the-flap satirical imagery and immersive mathematical text books. 

Please note: I am in the process of constructing my profile. Longer synopsis coming soon, or available on request.

The World of Homer

This talk examines the history and cultural legacy of the two earliest works in the western literary canon: the Iliad and the Odyssey. After an outline of each plotline, the talk will focus on how and why these poems have cast such a spell on artists and writers ever since, from ancient Greek tragedy and vase painting, through renaissance artists such as Botticelli and Bernini, and up to modern authors such as James Joyce and Madeleine Miller. Understanding the world of Homer is an essential element for understanding the history of western art. 

Carnations, Tulips and Hyacinths: The Story of Turkey’s Iznik Ceramics

Immerse yourself in a world of carnations, tulips, hyacinths and roses as you discover the history of the famous Turkish Iznik ceramics. From its origins imitating Chinese porcelain to its 16th-century heyday and subsequent decline. 

 Nick Salmond 

The Creation of the BBC

In this lecture, we look back at the creation of the BBC.  We investigate the invention and use of radio at the start of the 20th century and explore how the medium was first used as a form of mass communication. We look at the early days of the BBC, and some of the people who were vital to the success of the new company. We explore its relationship with the Government and the worries about the power of this radical new form of communication.  

John Singer Sargent: The Private Radical

Whether drawing duchesses or portraying princes, John Singer Sargent (1856–1925) was high society’s leading portraitist. Flaunting a consummate technique, his luxurious canvases mirrored his subjects’ wealth. Yet beneath the dazzling veneer of works such as Madame X, The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit and Lady Agnew of Lochnaw lurks a much rawer world by far. Sargent certainly scandalised Parisian society and the city’s Salon with his frank depictions of human sexuality, yet he was even more modern than they might have feared. This talk charts the artist’s life and his prolific output, showing that, like the era he came to represent, Sargent was always on the cusp of seismic change.

Who Dunnit:  Agatha Christie’s Life and Crimes in London

In this lecture we play armchair detective and follow trail of clues to discover more about the London life of the “Queen of Crime”.  Although Dame Agatha Christie is closely associated with Torquay in Devon, the world’s best selling author left a trail of clues for us to follow all over London. Living in various London properties during her long (and eventful) life, she penned 16 out of 66 novels from one London address alone! It was at University College London that she further developed her knowledge of her preferred method of murder; poison!

Many Arts Society members will recall the emotional film The Mission (1986) starring Robert de Niro. This startling presentation revisits the remote Jesuit communities of Bolivia portrayed in the film which Dr Griffiths knows personally from his concerts there in 1998 - given at the invitation of UNESCO. In ornate churches built by hand by the Chiquitos communities over many years the villagers regularly celebrate the achievements of their ancestors. For these were the true creators of the real music of the Latin American Baroque - not the Hollywood imitation! Remarkably, South America’s native composers were completely self-taught: the result is nothing short of miraculous for blending the solemnity of the European Baroque with the joyful energy of popular South American culture: including theatrical villancicos, operetta, and folk dances in an invigorating celebration of life - and eternal life.

Outstanding is the music of José Mauricio Nunes Garcia (1767-1830), a Brazilian priest of mixed race based in Rio de Janeiro whose music was acclaimed even in Vienna. (In 1992 Graham conducted the European premiere of his choral masterpiece OFFICIUM 1816 for Danish Radio.) Discover the wonders of this unique musical expression: the so-called Latin American Baroque! (Illustrated with sound recordings and images.)

This lecture will examine how the peculiar geniuses of these two very different men, W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan, came together under the guiding hand of the impresario, Richard D’Oyly Carte, to create one of the most individual and enduring forms of theatrical entertainment. The Savoy operas, with their gentle satire, celebrate the quirks and foibles of the British nation, and are as alive today as in the 1880s.

The lecture is fully illustrated with musical examples. 

In the 18th and 19th century British collectors were obsessed with Spanish art, particularly the paintings of Murillo and Velázquez. This lecture considers the development of that taste and the downfall of Murillo's popularity initiated by Ruskin. We will also explore many of the great collections in Britain, from the Duke of Wellington’s at Apsley house, to Pollok House in Glasgow and Kingston Lacy in Dorset.

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The Powder and the Glory: Helena Rubinstein, Cosmetics, Art and Wealth

There are no ugly women, only lazy ones, quipped cosmetics entrepreneur Helena Rubinstein, whose company made her one of the world's richest women. Business woman, art collector, and philanthropist, she was the first female millionaire. She commissioned work from avant-garde artists, Joan Miró, Picasso, Salvador Dali who was to design a powder compact for her. Her exclusive beauty salons influenced and blurred the conceptual boundaries between fashion, art galleries, and the domestic interior. 

Almost everyone has played Monopoly at some time in their life.  It is one of the world’s most popular and enduring board games.  But, how well do you really know it?

This talk starts with the original Landlord’s Game of 1903 and its evolution into the game as we know it today.  Based on the classic 1936 London version we then take a photographic journey around the locations on that Monopoly board.   Expect some surprises as we explore the relationships between the various properties, look at the ones that don’t actually exist and uncover the story behind the game we all know so well - or do we?

Artists were never far behind the explorers who opened up the west of America in the 19th Century. Sometimes they painted what they saw. Sometimes they painted what they wished they saw. Either way, painters like Alfred Miller, Frederick Church and Albert Bierstadt have left us a powerful, if romanticised, record of the country and people that the settlers found. Now we can use their pictures to chart the  history of the opening of America’s west - the arrival of the railroad, the confinement of native Americans into reservations, and the extermination of the buffalo.

This is a story on a big scale and it seems appropriate that among the pictures illustrating the lecture are some of the largest and most grandiloquent paintings of the era. After a period of deep neglect, they are now very much back in vogue, but whatever one thinks of their artistic merits, I hope audiences will agree with me that they are, above all, great fun. 

 PUBLIC ART

Public Art is a contentious subject. It is the most visible art form and therefore is an easy target. But how do they come to appear in our public spaces? This lecture tracks the development of public art over the last century and looks at various examples to see why are some loved and others loathed. It also explains the process of procurement from the initial commissioning to the production and installation. Drawing from my own experience and using case studies I take the audience through this process and try to show why we are all richer with the presence of art on the streets.

 MAD ABOUT THE BOY : NOEL COWARD 

John Osborne said, “Mr Coward is his own invention and contribution to this century. Anyone who cannot see that should keep well away from the theatre.” From fairly humble beginnings Noël Coward went on to establish himself as the most astonishing theatre animal of the 20th century. Playwright and composer, performer and director Noël Coward created some of the most memorable songs and plays in theatre history and some very witty quotes along the way.

THE JOY OF INDIAN CLASSICAL MUSIC

Indian classical music has a rich heritage stretching back beyond the thirteenth century. Its two major traditions - the Hindustani and the Carnatic - have given rise to some of the most beautiful and deeply spiritual music ever conceived. Yet Westerners tend to find it baffling.

This lecture aims to break down barriers to artistic appreciation by providing an introduction to the major traditions, artists and concepts that form the basis of the Indian classical tradition. By the end of the lecture you will know your sitar from your sarod, your sarangi from your shehnai, and your tanpura from your tabla.

Through musical examples and stunning images of India’s musical heritage, you will be given a key to unlock a wondrous world of music that you can continue to explore and enjoy for years to come.

SECRET ART IN THE PASSPORT - HOW WE USE IT TO FOX THE FORGER

From the wax seal to the microchip, man has exploited the skill of the artist and artisan in his attempt to manufacture a forgery-proof 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!

One of the world’s most popular athletic events commemorates Pheidippides’s epic run from the battlefield of Marathon to his native Athens.

Apart from the amazing courage of Pheidippides, why remember a battle that took place over two and a half thousand years ago? Since the 19th century, historians have argued that it was a crucial event, one that had decided ‘the whole future of human civilisation’. As John Stuart Mill put it, ‘the Battle of Marathon, even as an event in English history, is more important than the Battle of Hastings’.

Rupert re-creates the background and the battle itself in thrilling detail. He looks at the various ways in which ancient Athens has influenced our art and culture, and argues that Marathon was, indeed, the battle that saved ‘Western Civilisation’. Eye-opening, edge-of-your-seat stuff.

HANGING EVERYTHING – ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER AND THE PASSION OF MUSICAL THEATRE

Andrew Lloyd Webber is probably the most successful creative force within contemporary musical theatre. His music is known worldwide more than any other musical theatre composer, from the intense dramas of Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita and The Phantom of the Opera to the ever-tuneful Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and Cats. With such a range of stories and styles, what defines a ‘Lloyd Webber’ show? And what has driven such extraordinary achievement? This lecture will explore the biography, works and collaborations of Andrew Lloyd Webber to discover some answers and in the process outline some of the major shifts in pop music and musical theatre that the shows illustrate.

This lecture uses audio and video examples; demonstration from the piano included where society facilities allow and for online lectures.

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.

FROM PAPER TO PRINTING- THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE BOOK ALONG THE SILK ROAD

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Dr Susan Whitfield is a writer, scholar, lecturer and traveler of the Silk Roads. During 25 years curating the collections of over 50,000 medieval manuscripts from central Asia at the British Library, she also helped found and then developed an international collaboration working on the art and artefacts of the eastern Silk Roads.

She has lectured and written widely on the history and arts of the Silk Roads. Her latest book, Silk Roads: Peoples, Culture and Landscapes, was published by Thames & Hudson in October 2019 and translated into six languages. She has also curated several major exhibitions, with a forthcoming show at the Sainsbury Centre in Norwich, and has organized field trips to archaeological sites in the Taklamakan desert.

This lecture explores how Norse myths and legends have been portrayed in the decorative and fine arts over more than 1,300 years. In order to explain key themes in the artworks, the talk begins with a brief overview of the pantheon of deities, the Norse creation story and Ragnarök, the twilight of the gods. It then looks at Viking age representations in wood, stone and metalwork, the effect of Christianisation, and 16th century manuscripts illustrating the Icelandic Eddas.  It continues with 19th century paintings and sculpture created in a period of Scandinavian romantic nationalism, the appropriation of mythological images by the Nazi regime and more recent re-interpretations of Thor, Odin, Loki and the Valkyries in cartoon and Manga. 

Using these examples, the talk considers the change in materials used and the purpose of the depictions in a historical context. The lecture concludes by examining how historical and mythological subjects in art are used to express the cultural obsessions of the period in which they are created, rather than accurately depicting the underlying legends.

BRUEGEL: THE SEASONS AND THE WORLD

In 1565, Pieter Bruegel the Elder was commissioned to create a series of paintings for a dining room in Antwerp. The images, charting the course of a year, changed the way we view the world through art. Landscape had previously been a decorative backdrop to dramas both sacred and profane. But in Bruegel's hands the landscape and our interaction with it became the focus. Looking at paintings such as The Return of the Herd, Hunters in the Snow and The Gloomy Day, this lecture explores how Bruegel pioneered a whole new way of thinking about the environment and our individual places within a shifting cosmos.

Gavin Plumley is a writer and broadcaster, appearing on BBC Radio 3, BBC Radio 4 and contributing to newspapers, magazines and opera and concert programmes worldwide. Lectures widely about the culture of Central Europe during the 19th and 20th centuries. Recent talks include the Royal Opera House, the National Gallery, the National Trust, the National Theatre, the British Museum, the V&A, the Southbank Centre, the Tate and the Neue Galerie, New York. His first book, A Home for All Seasons, is published in June 2022. 

EERS, PLOUGHMEN AND MONKEYS’ BUMS – THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF MEDIAEVAL MANUSCRIPT MARGINALIA … INCLUDING THE TALE OF THE NUN AND THE PENIS TREE.

Dogs walk on hind legs playing bagpipes or donkeys play harps. Knights fight giant snails, there are hares that train bears, attack frightened hounds or drive a captured dog to the gallows. Castles are besieged by mice and a bull is milking a naked woman. Bared bums, either human or simian, abound: being kissed by bishops and priests; posteriors playing trumpets; shot by arrows or poked by a spear. A man gratuitously opens his bowels before both a nun and a nude bishop and monkeys moon at funerals whilst monks give the service. Nuns are depicted suckling a monkey or carried in a wheelbarrow pushed by a naked man, and, most bizarrely of all, picking penises from a tree.  Multitudes of rude, roguish and lascivious monkeys inhabit the pages.

As the austere head of the Cistercian order, Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153) wrote in his Apologia of 1125:

What is the point of those unclean apes, fierce lions, monstrous centaurs, half-men, striped tigers, fighting soldiers and hunters blowing their horns? In one place you see many bodies under a single head, in another several heads on a single body. Here on a quadruped we see the tail of a serpent. Over there on a fish we see the head of a quadruped. There we find a beast that is horse up front and goat behind, here another that is horned animal in front and horse behind…

His admonishment, however, was readily ignored, even in art and sculpture for the religious establishment.

From the late thirteenth century to about the middle of the fourteenth, in England, Northern France and Flanders specifically, the artists of illuminated manuscripts were to produce some of the greatest and most imaginative works in this genre. Within the margins and borders of religious texts such as books of prayer and psalms and of secular romances and epic poetry we see an astounding assortment of the amusing, absurd, fantastic, the ridiculously obscene and monstrous creations alongside scenes from everyday life and the natural world.

The period was one of increasing wealth and prosperity. Those from the landowning classes of the gentry, nobility and the church, together with the bourgeoisie from the growing towns and cities, became richer. More of the non-clerical population were able to read, stimulating a demand for books that were religious, instructional and entertaining. The increasing taste of these patrons for luxury and worldliness was reflected in the number and contents of the books they commissioned. Apart from the Latin texts of the psalters, bibles, breviaries and missals there were new secular titles in the vernacular such as romances and epic poems. The inclusion of marginalia in these books must therefore have been at the behest and approval of the patron.

These marginalia are not just grotesques and drolleries or simply mysterious and mischievous spontaneous doodles or even just the crude, vulgar and sometimes scatological renderings of a bored scribe. They were purposeful elements of the design that included savage satire and serious social observation but ultimately provided amusement.

The Luttrell Psalter, probably one of the most famous medieval manuscripts, has delightful and informative illustrations of contemporary rustic life that are exceptional in their number and fascinating detail. Commissioned by a wealthy landowner, Sir Geoffrey Luttrell, in the first half of the fourteenth century images depict men harvesting and winnowing wheat, women churning butter and feeding chickens, the lord hunting deer; wrestlers, hawkers, bear baiters, dancers, and musicians feature. Elsewhere a wife beats her husband with her distaff.

This lecture discusses the beliefs, inventions and ideas which led the illuminators to produce such strange images, the role of the patrons who bought or commissioned their work, and the social context of the period before the apocalypse of the Black Death from 1348. For us, they can provide insightful commentary about the cultural climate, values and beliefs in the northern Europe of the time.

 Martin Heard studied History of Art at Manchester University and afterwards spent three years in the editorial department of a fine art publishing company. My later career took detour into the world of information technology, during which time I had the opportunity to work and live for several years in both continental Europe and North America. Having 'retired' from this field of endeavour I now devote my time to researching mainly English eighteenth and late nineteenth century French art and architecture.

A PHOTOGRAPHIC ODYSSEY: SHACKLETON'S ENDURANCE EXPEDITION CAPTURED ON CAMERA (S)

On Ernest Shackleton’s third Antarctic expedition in 1914, his ship, the Endurance, was trapped and eventually crushed in the pack ice. After camping for five months on the ice, Shackleton’s men rowed to the remote Elephant Island. From there, Shackleton sailed for help to South Georgia over 800 miles away. Over three months later he returned to rescue the crew of the Endurance. Frank Hurley, one of the great photographers of the 20th century, was the expedition’s official photographer. His photographs are a visual narrative of an epic journey which capture with great artistry new and amazing landscapes within which a remarkable human drama is played out. The aim of the lecture is to capture Hurley’s achievements as a photographer of the Antarctic in the first flush of human contact when it was still essentially terra incognita.

Marc Cottle - Born on the Isles of Scilly and educated at Truro School, Cornwall, and Birmingham University. His career has been spent in education and training at home and abroad. He has lectured at Exeter College on Medieval and Tudor history, St Mark's & St John's University College, Plymouth, and at Bath University on Anglo Saxon and medieval England. Currently runs two small companies providing training and study breaks.

THE MAKING OF LANDSCAPE PHOTOGRAPHS

A fully illustrated talk with in excess of 60 images exploring the relationship between the making of an image and the way in which it is perceived by the viewer. Further discussion around the eye and the brain being an extraordinary double act made up of visual references and intellectual interpretation. 

One of the world's leading landscape photographers, Charlie Waite has lectured for 25 years throughout the UK, Europe and the US. He has held numerous one-man exhibitions in London, exhibited twice in Tokyo, and was awarded the prestigious honorary Fellowship of the British Institute of Professional Photographers, as well as a Direct Fellowship by the Royal Photographic Society. In 2007, he launched LPOTY - UK Landscape Photographer of the Year. Amongst many publications, the most recent includes Landscape; the Story of 50 Photographs (2005), and Arc & Line (2011). He was invited by the Royal Academy to exhibit in 2015's summer exhibition.

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Henry Purcell has been described as ‘England’s Orpheus’ and ranks alongside the greatest of this country’s composers. His rise to Organist of Westminster Abbey at the age of 20 saw him lauded above the talents of his predecessor, John Blow and his teacher, Pelham Humfrey, both of 

BEFORE THE RAJ: BRITISH LIFE IN INDIA, C1775-1845

During the early years of British settlement in India, the nature of the lifestyles to be adopted was uncertain. Looking at portraits and printed material – both serious and satirical – we will examine how the lives of the early settlers were presented to a wider audience. Through this, we will explore some of the tensions between maintaining their Britishness and adapting to local conditions.

Prasannajit de Silva completed his doctorate in 2007, researching the art of the British in India during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. His lecturing covers British visual culture of the eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries, including art produced in various colonial settings. He is particularly interested in the relationship of aspects of art, architecture, and design to their broader cultural, social, and political contexts, and also teaches courses on the methods and theoretical approaches of art history. His current work includes roles as Associate Lecturer at Birkbeck, University of London and Sessional Lecturer for the WEA.  

DALE CHIHULY: THE WORLD'S FOREMOST GLASS ARTIST

American glass artist Dale Chihuly (born 1941) is the super- star of the glass world. With his passion for glass, his larger-than-life personality, his skills as a natural leader and educator, and his constant exploration of glass's luminous qualities and colour possibilities, he creates glass sculptures which are extravagant, colourful and spectacular. Following two accidents he is no longer able to hold a blowing iron and now employs two glass teams to blow his visions from his spontaneous drawings, themselves works of art. His glass magic has transformed the studio glass movement and altered our visual perceptions of this extraordinary material forever. 

Former Director of Broadfield House Glass Museum (1974-2003) and one of the top authorities on glass in the country. Author of British Glass 1800-1914 (1991), 20th Century British Glass (2009) and contributor to numerous books and magazines. Lectures internationally to glass museums and collector's societies. Fellow of the Society of Glass Technology, and a member of the Arts Advisory Board at the National Glass Centre, Sunderland. President of the Glass Association which he was instrumental in founding.

We are now meeting in our new venue The Bapist Church, Cecil Road, Enfield.

The remarkable untold story of Carry On actor Peter Butterworth, and his wife, Britain’s first female TV impressionist Janet Brown, best known for her impression of Mrs Thatcher. 

Using classic film and tv clips, personal mementos, and rare photographs and letters from his family’s unseen collection, Tyler reveals the private story behind his parents’ public lives.

It’s a journey that takes in MI9, the building of a theatre in the notorious WW2 Prisoner of War camp Stalag Luft III, nights at Chequers with a Prime Minister, This Is Your Life, and many more moments in their long, shared life in the theatre. 

 Tyler Butterworth grew up in a theatrical family and spent twenty five years as an actor working extensively in film, television, theatre and radio. He then worked as a development producer in television documentaries and was closely involved with NASA on a landmark commemorative tv series. Now, he works as a voice actor, recording audiobooks, documentaries and voiceovers, and he produces walking audio guides to cities across Europe for private clients on whatever subject he’s commissioned to do. They’re just like the audio guides you get in art galleries and museums but they’re out on the street. He lives in Sussex where he walks on the South Downs and the South Coast

Peter Medhurst 

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.

2023 marks the 600th anniversary of the fabled Dick Whittington (c.1354-1423). 

For many of us, Dick is simply a fictional character from a Ladybird book or the Christmas pantomime. In fact he was very real, indeed one of the major movers and shakers of medieval London.

In this lecture we separate the man from the myth as we follow his footsteps through the streets that were not exactly 'paved with gold....'. Apprenticed to a master mercer Whittington went on to become one of the wealthiest and most successful textile merchants in the City, bankrolled no fewer than 3 medieval kings and as a result held the office of Lord Mayor of London no fewer than four times. And what of that famous feline companion ? Well, the church that he built might just provide the answer but the lecture reveals all......

Please note this was to have been our AGM - we now plan to hold this on a separate day via zoom. When a date has been decided we will let you know. The booked lecture will go ahead as usual of course.

Standing in the nave of Ely cathedral when I was 14, I stopped listening to the guide saying how long and how high and started wondering how on earth ordinary human beings created sky-scraping, dizzyingly high buildings on which even the top-most parts were delicately decorated. How, why and for whom were my questions. For God, for personal redemption and to make a living are the answers to the last two of those, but the "how" was harder to fathom.

In this lecture we meet the Master Masons who both designed the buildings and ran the site. They commanded everything whether it was sourcing the vast quantities of wood and stone, recruiting the workforce or knowing enough about their various trades to be able to create heaven on earth out the cacophony of thousands of chisels and hammers. These men were charismatic leaders, but they were continually checked by their fellow Master Masons in the interests of making a building as strong as possible - we only see their successes, after all. They were real people who got into trouble with the law, who occasionally cheated on contracts, who liked to start a job but not to finish it. On the other hand, their creations remain to this day, some breathtakingly beautiful in their exquisite detail causing us, centuries later, to stand in a nave and wonder.

In his heyday, the animal artist Edwin Landseer was hugely celebrated and loved for his dogs and Highland stags; later, for his lions in Trafalgar Square. He was a child prodigy; aged 5 years old he made a detailed study of a foxhound which astounded everybody; later he became known for his vivid and varied textures of animal skin, hair and fur, which he achieved with special brushes, keeping their design a secret. He was a party man, with party tricks; with his left hand he could draw a horse’s head and with his right a stag’s head complete with horns – at the same time!

Most widely appreciated for his dogs, he could paint comic dogs, tragic dogs and in-between dogs, and he became known - with some justification - as the Shakespeare of Dogs.

He was socially much in demand with the aristocracy and with Royalty, teaching the Queen and Prince to etch. But after awhile it all gets too exhausting; the celebrated artist feels happier up in the Highlands of Scotland. He ends up stressed, drunk and mad, comparing himself to one of his own hunted stags. Nobody can get him to behave except his neighbour Mrs Pritchard, an elderly widow said to look like “ a very small monkey, with bright blinking eyes and a merry mouth.” 

When Sir Edwin died they named a pub after him; they buried him in St Paul’s Cathedral, and someone put black wreaths around the necks of those lions in Trafalgar Square. 

Karin is known for her entertaining lectures on writers and diarists connected with the arts from the mid-18th to 19th century, and moving forward in time with Virginia Woolf. Extensive research into diaries and letters bring lectures to vivid life. Karin illustrates them with slides of contemporary pictures and portraits from varied sources.

In 1906 when the Royal Dance Troupe of Cambodia performed in Paris they created a sensation. The sculptor Auguste Rodin was in the audience and was captivated by the exquisite dancers whose meditative poses recalled the friezes on the temples of Angkor. This lecture describes the encounter and reveals the history of Cambodian dance that goes back to the origins of Angkor.

Denise Heywood is an Art historian, author, lecturer, photographer and journalist. Worked in Cambodia in the 1990s and has been a scholar of Southeast Asian art ever since. Her books include one on the Buddhist temples of Laos, Ancient Luang Prabang and Laos, also in French, and Cambodian Dance Celebration of the Gods, with a foreword by the daughter of King Sihanouk. Lectures for the Art Fund, the University of London School of Oriental and African Studies on their post-graduate Asian Art Course and for the V&A; also for organisations such as Madingley Hall (University of Cambridge), the British Museum, the Royal Society for Asian Affairs, Asia House, the National Trust, the Royal Geographical Society and has lectured worldwide for universities, museums, colleges, art institutions, literary societies and travel organisations. She writes for art, literary and travel publications and has appeared on television and radio. She has led cultural tours to Southeast Asia and France for the Royal Academy, the Art Fund, Asia House and many more and lectures on cruise ships. 

JEROME KERN, IRVING BERLIN, COLE PORTER AND GEORGE GERSHWIN: AN INTRODUCTORY LECTURE

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

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

TREASURES OF THE TURF - THE FINE AND DECORATIVE ARTS OF HORSERACING

Treasures of the Turf, looks at the history of horseracing. From the late seventeenth century to the modern period, this lecture looks at the development of the sport in this country through its associated cultural material. Using the wealth of paintings, archive material and decorative art objects associated with and depicting the ‘Sport of Kings’, the lecture takes as its starting point the earliest origins of the sport including the development of Newmarket and the Jockey Club as racing’s ‘Headquarters’. Treasures of the Turf also explores other influential racing circuits and because of the national nature of the sport can be adapted to include links to your local area.

Christopher Garibaldi  is an Independent Researcher. 2010–2019 Director of Palace House, Newmarket (National Heritage Centre for Horseracing and Sporting Art: www.palacehousenewmarket.co.uk). 2008–2010 Co-Director of the Attingham Summer School for the Study of Historic Houses and Collections. 1998–2003 Senior Curator & Assistant Keeper of Art (Decorative Art) at Norwich Castle Museum: co-curator of Flower Power – The Meaning of Flowers in Art and Eat, Drink and Be Merry, the British at Table 1600 to 2000. 1994–1997 Catalogued the silver in the Royal Collection at Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle and other royal residences.

HEAVEN ON EARTH: A ROAD TRIP THROUGH MEDIEVAL BURGUNDY

 Settled by the Romans, who first brought wine and gastronomy to this most luscious of French regions, Burgundy is packed with stupendous and moving architectural wonders dating from the eleventh and twelfth centuries – many of them now World Heritage Sites. Autun, Vezelay, Fontenay, Pontigny and Cluny were spiritual service stations for crusaders, pilgrims and monks, profoundly influencing Western European art in the middle ages. From the heavenly portals and sculpted capitals of the Côte-d'Or to the Maconnais, come on an armchair tour through this most gorgeous Romanesque terroir, and find out how those Benedictine abbeys and Cistercian monasteries in turn created some of the best wines in the world on their estates which we still enjoy today. Travel tips and tasting recommendations included!

​Dr Caroline Shenton is an archivist and historian. She was formerly Director of the Parliamentary Archives in London, and before that was a senior archivist at the National Archives. Her book The Day Parliament Burned Down won the Political Book of the Year Award in 2013 and Mary Beard called it ‘microhistory at its absolute best’. Its acclaimed sequel, Mr Barry’s War, about the rebuilding of the Palace of Westminster, was a Book of the Year in 2016 for The Daily Telegraph and BBC History Magazine and was described by Lucy Worsley as "a real jewel, finely wrought and beautiful". Caroline was Political Writer in Residence at Gladstone’s Library in 2017, has appeared at the Cheltenham, Hay and Henley literary festivals and on BBC radio and TV. Caroline’s third book, National Treasures, will tell the extraordinary and sometimes hilarious stories behind the saving of London’s art and museum collections in World War Two.

FASHION, FURY & FEMINISM: WOMEN’S FIGHT FOR CHANGE. The Dark Side of Fashion

For half a century, from the 1870s to the 1920s, women around the world were in thrall to feathered fashion. Not just feathers, but wings and whole birds – often several birds at a time – were de rigeur on top of hats.The cost to the birds was high.

The exploitation of female labour was troubling.

But the hats themselves were magnificent objects of art…

I’ll be shining a light on the Victorian plumage trade’s shadowy back-story. Whose fingers put together those voluptuous hats? Who dyed the feathers? Who profited from the sales? How did this arcane commodity chain work? Digging deep in the archives, we’ll hear some revealing human stories – from the brisk black market trade in stolen ostrich feathers, to the celebrity lifestyle of a notorious plumage hunter, to the Edwardian It Girl’s go-to milliner.   

Tessa 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.  

 Jorge Lowinski

 Mario Testino and David Bailey may be household names that spring to mind when we think of the great fashion and portrait photographers of the 20 th century. But where does Jorge Lewinski’s reputation lie amongst these significant individuals? Have you heard of him? Jorge Lewinski, born in Lwow, Poland (now Ukraine) in 1921, has an unparalleled reputation for capturing portraits of the iconic British painters and sculptors of the 20th century. Having based his home and career in London from 1942, Lewinski photographed over 300 leading British artists principally between 1962 and 1995. We learn about his prolific career; what made the photographer and how significant are his photographs in revealing the character of each sitter as both a person and as an artist. With an unapologetic focus on 20th century Royal Academicians in particular, although by no means exclusive, this lecture considers Lewinski’s portraits of a selection of great 20th century British artists such as David Hockney, Henry Moore, Antony Gormley. Allen Jones, Michael Craig-Martin and Barbara Hepworth. Through the work of Lewinski, we can also explore the artistic contributions that these painters and sculptors have made/are making to the British art scene.

Pamela Campbell-Johnston 

MA Hons Art History, St Andrew's University. Over 20 years of lecturing experience to undergraduates, adult groups, and to Friends and Patrons of the Royal Academy of Arts as part of the Adult Education Department's programme of events. Also conducted numerous guided tours and focused gallery talks on individual works of art. Specialises in British Domestic Architecture and Modern British Art. Over 12 years' experience at the Royal Academy. Work experience also undertaken at Bonhams, Art Loss Register, National Trust. Now a freelance art consultant and lecturer. Recently curated a collection for the Lansdowne Club.

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

Since 1986 Tim has given 1,500 public lectures. It 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 he 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.

The first bodies to be built on early motor cars were constructed by carriage makers - many of these vehicles being just existing carriages with added motors. We still talk of 'carriageways' and 'coachwork'. Gradually, however as technology progressed and cars became faster, new materials and techniques produced special styles, more jazz age than Edwardian. This lecture describes some typical carriages of the 19th century, and looks at the transition which eventually created the extravagant bodies on the great marques of the first half of the 20th. 

Clive Bonham Carter studied Egyptology at Cambridge. Has lectured to Probus, the Rotary Club, U3A, the City Literary Institute and the Guildford Institute of the University of Surrey. Has for thirty years been a teacher in secondary education. Member of the Egypt Exploration Society, being awarded an EES Scholarship to the Saqqara Expedition of 1964-5.

A Carpet Ride to Khiva – Exploring the Revival of 15th Century Timurid carpet designs From Persian Illuminated Manuscripts – Chris Aslan Alexander

This is a narrative approach to the revival of 15thC carpets in Khiva, a desert oasis in Uzbekistan. Illuminations on vellum – containing the only surviving representations of textiles from this era – flourished despite the Islamic prohibition on representative art – and are all we had left of Timurid carpets until Chris Alexanders workshop began to weave them again.  The lecture will examine the traditional role of carpet weaving and embroidery in the social lives of Central Asian women and how social and political influences led to the decline of textile production.

We will start this meeting iwth our AGM and follow on with a full Arts Society Lecture,

Love Atually - your favourite Christmas movie will never be the same again!

When Richard Curtis interweaved ten stories with equal doses of comedy and tragedy in Love Actually, he created one of our best loved Christmas movies. But could it be that the stories are not entirely what they seem? In this entirely original and definitely unauthorised lecture, Mary presents her insights into how Shakespeare’s four great tragedies (and other classical masterpieces) lurk just under the surface.

This lecture will be live at St Pauls and presented live on zoom at the same time. Please do join us either on zoom or in person. We are really excited to be getting back togther and are very much looking forward to seeing everyone.

A Decorative Art: The History of Wallpaper – Joanna Banham

The history of wallpaper is a long and fascinating subject that dates back to the 16thC and encompasses a huge range of beautiful patterns created by both anonymous hands and by some of the best known designers of the 19th and 20th centuries.  This lecture explores the history and development of this product from earliest times up to the present day.

The Queen of Instruments: The Lute within Old Master Paintings – Adam Busiakiewicz

The lute holds a special place in the history of art. In the 16th century, during the rise of humanism, the lute was a becoming pastime of educated courtiers, as depicted by the likes of Holbein and Titian; throughout the 17th century, the instrument continued to play a key role in emphasising the intimate, debauched and transient pleasures of interior scenes by Jan Steen and portraits by Frans Hals. This lecture looks at the lute, and other musical instruments, as devices to express various aspects of the human character throughout the ages.

Sewn and Sown: The Gardens of Restoration England – Lucy Hughes – Hallett

The Royalist landowners returning from exile on Charles ll’s Restoration in 1660 brought with them, from Holland or France, new tastes in garden design.  Paintings and plans of the new gardens created during the late Stuart period – many of them by Dutch and Flemish artists who travelled over with the restored King.

Eleanor Coade and Her Stone – Angela Smith

Coade is an artificial stone that was invented in the 18th century. It was widely used for freestanding statuary and monuments, architectural detailing and even garden furniture.  Hundreds of examples can still be seen across Britain. This lecture tells the story of Mrs Coade and the artificial stone that made her one of the most successful businesswomen in the late 1700s.

Provenance Matters.  The Mass Faking Of the Russian Avant Garde on the World Art Market 2000-2018 – James Butterwick

With the opening of Russia post-glasnost came a huge surge of interest in the Russian Avant Garde. Previously unknown artists became famous and much sought-after by the new Russian-buying public.  With their reappearance however, came an industrial-scale level of faking of their pictures, together with other artists of the period, often with the connivance, unwitting or otherwise, of Western and Russian experts.

Reputed specialists have estimated that as many as 95% of pictures on the market are unacceptable to any leading auction house, museum or dealer.

Eric Gill: the early years – Caroline Walker

The work of controversial artist Eric Gill is woven into the fabric of our lives - in the typefaces on our computers, in the lettering on our rail network, in the images on our Christmas cards, and in the sculpture on public buildings such as the BBC.  This illustrated lecture by his great-niece  explores how Gill’s family background, friendships and passions influenced his work, and attempts to explain how this poor clergyman’s son came to be regarded as one of the greatest artist-craftsmen of the 20th century.

Santa Claus: The Art that turns him from St Nicholas into Father Christmas

Nicholas was the Greek Bishop of Myra, a 4th century port in Anatolia. Following his death, his legendary generosity established him as the principle gift-giving saint. Also the patron saint of seafarers, his body was stolen by Italian sailors to protect their own ports.

Over the centuries the image of St Nicholas changed constantly until the Dutch re-invented him as Sinterklaas. Taking him to their new colonies in America, he transformed into kindly Santa Claus. Later re-imported into Britain without his Catholic baggage, he gradually emerged as Father Christmas - the jovial giver of presents.

DETAILS

Expert in the history and culture of the Middle East and North Africa. As a professional tour guide and lecturer he has led groups throughout the Middle East and Asia. Has written extensively on Arabia and is the author of The Discovery Guide to Yemen, Insight Guide to the Silk Road and Berlitz Guides to Libya; The Red Sea; Cairo; Abu Dhabi and Nile Cruising. As a photographer has pictures represented by four photographic libraries. A broad range of lecturing experience, including to the Royal Geographical Society and the Royal Institute of British Architects. As a film producer and cameraman he has made documentaries for the BBC, National Geographic TV and Channel 4.

The Genius of Raphael

This lecture charts the meteoric rise to prominence of the artist Raphael (1483-1520). In 1500, aged seventeen, Raphael entered the workshop of the successful Umbrian artist Pietro Perugino and so began his emergence as one of the greatest masters of the High Renaissance. While lacking his older rivals Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) and Michelangelo Buonarroti’s (1475- 1564) advantage of being born and trained in Florence, he was generally admitted to be their equal. Raphael’s early work is analysed alongside his commissions in Florence and for the Papacy in Rome which demonstrate the genius of his extraordinary talent.

For our AGM event this year we will be having a performance by Alexis Leighton and Helix Productions via Zoom.

This will be "In the Secret Garden of Frances Hodgson Burnett", who wrote Little Lord Fauntleroy and The Secret Garden. it will focus on her life and works and last about 45 minutes. It is partiularly apt as a new film of the Secret Garden is due to be released very soon.

We very much hope you will join us at 10.30 on the 29th October, the Zoom details will be sent out a few days before and you are welcome to share them with friends and family if you know of anyone you think will be interested.

As you will be aware the AGM itself will be held just with the committee this year having got all your views in advance. The AGM papers will be sent out in early October and we would ask that you return them with your votes and comments by 2nd November 2020.

Ralph's interest is mid eighteenth century English Rococo silver. He brings with him the pieces he is going to talk about for the listeners to handle and examine, together with a comprehensive collection of power point images, with close ups of features of interest. The Huguenot influence on this most decorative period is discussed, where new silversmithing techniques fused with new designs; together with methods of manufacture, interpreting the engraved heraldry of the items, and the social context.

He makes the talk entertaining as well as informative by taking the audience on a journey to uncover the original owners by tracing the heraldry, shows portraits of them, and reveals some of the life story associated with them; fabulously wealthy aristocrats and middling sorts, they variously had a stint in the Tower of London, had tragic family circumstances, had their descendents gamble away their estates, found their wife in a bed she should certainly not have been in, or were dragged to their death in an overturned carriage... Knowing the exploits of these original owners of these pieces adds considerably to their interest and brings another dimension to the handling.

DETAILS

Ralph Hoyle was a schoolboy member of the Wine Label Circle, a society devoted to the study of silver decanters labels, and went on to be its President. He is a long standing member of the Silver Society. He has given talks to the Art Fund, Sheffield Assay Office, American Society for Eighteenth Century Studies, Historic Houses and small charity raising events. He brings pieces from his own collection for the audience to handle and examine while he is discussing design, social context and makes revelations about the original owners he has identified from the heraldry.

In view of the changes forced upon us by the coronavirus this year we have decided to put on an extra lecture via zoom on Thursday August 20th starting at 10.30am.

Members will receive the zoom details by email a few days before the talk and we are suggesting that if possible you invite a friend round if you know someone who would like to join us. It does not matter if they are a member or not. Or -if you prefer- forward the zoom details to them to watch from their own home - the talk is open to all with the zoom details.

Our speaker Nigel Bates has been a performer for more than 40 years in and out of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. he was Principal Percussionist with their orchestra  for seventeen years and also spent eight years as musical administrator of the Royal Ballet.

It should be an excellent event and we hope you can join us.

CANCELLED

The History of The Royal Parks

London's royal parks are among its most beautiful and beloved spaces: just as much as the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace or St Pancras Station, the mere mention of Hyde or Regent's Park is enough to evoke the capital in all its glory for residents and tourists alike. They have a grand history - some were royally owned as far back as the Norman conquest, others were acquired by Henry VIII during the Reformation - and since being opened to the public during the eighteenth century, they have hosted some of London's great events, including the Great Exhibition and innumerable jubilees and celebrations. This lecture tells the story of all eight of the parks from the point when they were acquired by the monarchy until the present day, including the major historic moments and events with which they are associated.

DETAILS

Paul Rabbitts graduated at Sheffield with a BA Honours in Geography followed by a Masters Degree in Landscape Architecture at Edinburgh. He is a qualified landscape architect and park manager and has worked for several local authorities across the UK. He is a passionate advocate for public parks and in particular the Victorian and Edwardian bandstand and is a prolific author on the subject. His first of 14 books were published in 2011 on the iconic bandstand and was followed rapidly by books on the Royal Parks, our Great British Parks and most recently on ‘Parkitecture’, as well as some of our greatest park designers. He is now working on a biography of Sir Christopher Wren. Now a UK leading expert on bandstands he has been asked to assist in localised restoration projects nationwide and has been a regular and popular speaker on bandstands and public parks for many years.

CANCELLED

Oh We do Like to be beside the seaside 

A light-hearted look at seaside entertainment over the years, from Bathing Machines to End of the Pier Shows and “What the Butler Saw” machines. The British seaside began with the fashion for sea bathing in the 18th century, but expanded enormously in the 19th century with the arrival of the railways and the era of mass travel. We look at the specialist buildings which proliferated at the seaside in the 19th century, such as piers, towers and aquaria, that provided entertainment for the masses – not to mention that famous breed, the seaside landlady!

DETAILS

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

CANCELLED

A Decorative Art the History of Wallpapers

Wallpaper is often regarded as the Cinderella of the Decorative Arts – the most ephemeral and least precious of the decorations produced for the home. Yet, the history of wallpaper is a long and fascinating subject that dates back to the 16th century and encompasses a huge range of beautiful patterns created both by anonymous hands and by some of the best-known designers of the 19th and 20th centuries. This lecture explores the history and development of this product from earliest times up to the present day. It includes a discussion of the changing ways in which wallpaper was made and a survey of designs from the first black and white patterns, the creation of elegant flock hangings, the fashion for Chinese hand-painted papers, the introduction of machine-printing, the designs of Morris and the Arts and Crafts Movement, and the taste for Modernist and Contemporary designs in the 20thcentury. It also includes a discussion of the ways that wallpapers were used within grand and more ordinary homes and hopes to justify the claim that they were indeed a truly Decorative Art.

DETAILS

Jo Banham is a freelance curator, lecturer and writer. From 2006-2016 she was Head of Adult Learning at the Victoria & Albert Museum, and before that Head of Learning and Access at the National Portrait Gallery, and Head of Public Programmes at Tate Britain. She has also been Curator of Leighton House and Assistant Keeper at the Whitworth Art Gallery. She has published on many aspects of Victorian and early 20th century decoration and interiors. She is currently curating an exhibition on William Morris and the Arts and Crafts Movement for the Juan March Fundacion in Madrid and the Museu Nacional d’Art Catalunya in Barcelona. She is also Director of the Victorian Society Summer School.

CANCELLED

From Phaetons to Phantoms: 100 Years of Coachbuilding

The first bodies to be built on early motor cars were constructed by carriage makers - many of these vehicles being just existing carriages with added motors. We still talk of 'carriageways' and 'coachwork'. Gradually, however as technology progressed and cars became faster, new materials and techniques produced special styles, more jazz age than Edwardian. This lecture describes some typical carriages of the 19th century, and looks at the transition which eventually created the extravagant bodies on the great marques of the first half of the 20th. 

DETAILS

Studied Egyptology at Cambridge. Has lectured to Probus, the Rotary Club, U3A, the City Literary Institute and the Guildford Institute of the University of Surrey. Has for thirty years been a teacher in secondary education. Member of the Egypt Exploration Society, being awarded an EES Scholarship to the Saqqara Expedition of 1964-5.

CANCELLED
 

A Carpet Ride to Khiva : Exploring the revival of 15c Timurid Carpet designs from Persian Illuminated Manuscripts

This is a narrative approach to the revival of 15th century carpet designs from illuminated manuscripts in Khiva, a desert oasis in Uzbekistan. Illuminations on vellum – containing the only surviving representations of textiles from this era – flourished, despite the Islamic prohibition on representative art.  The lecture will examine the traditional role of carpet weaving and embroidery in the social lives of Central Asian women and how social and political influences led to the decline of textile production. How do the constraints of gender-inequality, corruption and the sourcing of natural dyes from neighbouring Afghanistan continue to challenge attempts at reviving the rich textile heritage of Khiva, Bukhara and Samarkand?

DETAILS

Chris was born in Turkey (hence his middle name) and spent his childhood there and in war-torn Beirut. After school, Chris spent two years at sea before studying Media and journalism at Leicester University. He then moved to Khiva, a desert oasis in Uzbekistan, establishing a UNESCO workshop reviving fifteenth century carpet designs and embroideries, creating income for women. After a year in the UK writing A Carpet Ride to Khiva, he moved to the Pamirs in Tajikistan, training yak herders to comb their yaks for their cashmere-like down, spending three years there. Next came two years in Kyrgyzstan living in the world’s largest natural walnut forest and establishing a wood-carving workshop. Chris has recently finished rowing and studying at Oxford and is now a curate at St. Barnabas, North Finchley, and author of Alabaster and Manacle. He returns to Central Asia whenever he can and conducts tours there.

Celebrating its 100th anniversary in 2019, the Bauhaus was the most innovative and influential school of design in the 20th Century.  Founded on a belief in the transformative potential of industrial design, it combined avant-garde ideas about abstract art with a thoroughly conscientious approach to social reform, mass production and the built environment. Paradoxically it was the Nazis' attempts to obliterate the school in 1933 that led to the dispersal of its teachers and students to the four corners of the world, taking its values and techniques with them...

From Downton to Gatsby jewellery and fashion from 1890-1929

For the series Downton Abbey, Andrew was commissioned to produce many jewels for the main characters, and this inspired him to create a talk based on Downton and the changing styles of the time portrayed.

Jewellery and Fashion are often seen as two entirely separate and distinct fields of design, but this is very far from the case.

In his talk Andrew guides you through the extraordinary periods and events between 1890 and 1929, where the great fashion houses collaborated with the finest of jewellers to produce works of art of outstanding quality and glittering opulence. Along with this he discusses the clients and patrons who commissioned the jewels and how they were worn with the sumptuous gowns. To accompany his study day, he brings with him many of the pieces used in Downton, so the audience can see what was worn, close up.

DETAILS

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

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

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

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

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

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

Even in ancient Rome people made complaints about the mid-winter Saturnalia celebrations remarkably like the ones we hear today about our commercialised Christmas. In a light-hearted historical review we discover some wonderful and some gloriously awful Christmas imagery, from Giotto’s painting of the first Christmas crib until Dickens meets Coca Cola amongst the movers and shakers who sometimes seem to have turned Christmas into Kitschmas. 

David Phillips studied History at Oxford, and from 1968-82 worked for Nottingham Castle Museum.  He was a lecturer in Museum Studies and Art History at University of Manchester and has published a book about museum practice with Manchester University Press, Exhibiting Authenticity 1997. 

 Gustav Klimt and his colleagues broke away from the imperially endorsed art institutions in Vienna in 1897 and founded the Secession. That was the same year that Gustav Mahler arrived to take charge of the Opera House in the city. Comparing these two totemic fin de siècle talents, this lecture places Klimt and Mahler in context, asking what fundamentally links and, indeed, divides them.

Gavin Plumley is a writer and broadcaster, appearing on BBC Radio 3, BBC Radio 4 and contributing to The Independent on Sunday and The Guardian.  He lectures widely about the culture of Central Europe during the 19th and 20th centuries, including to the National Gallery, the British Museum, the V&A, the Southbank Centre, the Tate and the Neue Galerie, New York, as well as for History of Art societies and The Art Fund. 

 A a whistle-stop tour of the history of food as artistic medium; starting with 16th century sugar sculpture and venturing all the way up to 3D dessert printing and beyond. Hosted by Food Historian Tasha Marks, this lecture is a treat for those with a sweet tooth, as Marks feels the subject of food and art through the ages is most exciting in the realms of the dessert. Topics covered include; the origins of dessert, the crossover between sugar and art, architecture and dessert (including Renaissance banqueting houses), sugar and spectacle, food as artistic medium, and the future of food. This exploration into the realms of dessert as spectacle includes an accompanying display to illustrate and enhance the historic subject.

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

The English language is rich in idioms, phrases and sayings which are part of everyday speech yet seldom do we consider their original meanings. This is an exploration of historical etymology, often traceable to the City of London. Even if you have to ‘rob Peter to pay Paul’ and it’s ‘raining cats and dogs’ you’d be ‘barking mad’ to miss this lecture.

Alan Read holds a masters and a first class honours degree in History of Art from Birkbeck College. He is a gallery guide at Tate Modern, Tate Britain and National Portrait Gallery, and has lectured at the NPG, Penlee House (Penzance), Plymouth City Art Gallery, Croydon Clocktower and the Bridewell Institute. He is also a London Blue Badge Guide and City of London Guide and has conducted walking tours for the Twentieth Century Society, the National Trust and team London Bridge.

The City of London is home to no fewer than forty Livery Company Halls, almost as many as existed immediately prior to the Great Fire of London. Many of the Halls succumbed to the fire, others to the Blitz, and several to the property developer, but they all contain a wealth of treasures in art, sculpture, stained glass, silverware and furniture. Collectively the Livery Companies are custodians of an immense array of treasures of national significance including many Royal portraits such as that of HM The Queen during her Golden Jubilee year, commissioned by the Drapers’ Company which with the Sandringham Branch of the Women’s Institute is one of only two organisations of which HM is a member.

Paul Jagger is a Court Assistant of The Worshipful Company of Information Technologists and author of The City of London Freeman’s Guide - the definitive concise guide to the City of London’s customs, ceremonies, officers, institutions, landmarks and traditions. He has a particular interest in the treasures and heraldry of the City’s Livery Companies. In April 2016 Paul received the City’s prestigious Root and Branch Award from the Lord Mayor of the City of London for his work in promoting awareness and understanding of the City of London and its Livery Companies, particularly their beneficial impact on wider society.

Paul is a member of many heritage and history bodies including The Arts Society, the Cambridge University Heraldic & Genealogical Society, the White Lion Society (supporting HM College of Arms), The Heraldry Society (England and Wales) and he is a life member of London Historians, the National Trust and English Heritage. He is a member of the City Livery Club and a life member of Farringdon Ward Club.

In his professional life Paul leads a consulting team for IBM in the field of workplace learning and development. He is a Chartered IT Professional, a Fellow of BCS The Chartered Institute for IT, an external consultant to City & Guilds, the Open University and a visiting lecturer at City University (London).

He formerly served with 101 (City of London) Engineer Regiment (EOD) - one of the City’s privileged regiments and is a life member of the Victory Services Club and of 101 Engineer Regiment’s regimental association.

In 1917 Wilkinson (1878-1971), a first-rate painter and poster designer, invented Dazzle ‘camouflage’. Thousands of British and Allied ships were painted with vivid and violently contrasting patterns of colour to deter U-boat attacks. Discover the life and work of Wilkinson and his Dazzle scheme that continues to inspire art and design. Was it really inspired by Cubism, Futurism and Vorticism? 

Dr James Taylor studied at the Universities of St Andrews and Manchester, and is a former curator of paintings, drawings and prints, and co-ordinator of various exhibitions and galleries, at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, also lecturer and ships' historian on board cruise ships. his publications include illustrated histories of Marine Painting (1995) and yachting art Yachts on Canvas (1998), The Voyage of the Beagle: Darwin’s extraordinary adventure aboard FitzRoy’s famous survey ship (2008), Careless Talk Costs Lives: Fougasse and the Art of Public Information (2010) and Your Country Needs You: the Secret History of the Propaganda Poster (2013). He completed his PhD at the University of Sussex in 2015 on the voyager artist William Westall (1781-1850) who sailed with Commander Matthew Flinders aboard HMS 'Investigator' (1801-1803) the first ship to circumnavigate Australia. Guided tours of the buildings and artworks of the National Maritime Museum can be arranged for groups.

 The cartoonist, Carl Giles, once said that he loved his creation, Grandma Giles – that fearsome, black-clad, gambling, drinking battleaxe – because she allowed him to say things through his cartoons that he was too polite to say in person. She helped him to poke fun at authority in all its forms, from Hitler to traffic wardens and even his employers at the Daily Express, who didn’t trust him and had sub-editors scouring his cartoons for subversive background details.

His admirers include 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.

The theatre of the 1930s reflected the turbulent, changing society between the wars. While the West End had the wit and escapism of Noel Coward and Ivor Novello and the great public packed Variety Theatres there was also a new theatre movement created by the legacy of WW1. The working class theatre movement in England personified by Unity Theatre in London and Joan Littlewood and Ewan McColl’s Theatre Workshop offered new opportunities for writers and actors and also explored new forms of presenting plays and of writing about subjects that were unlikely to be seen in theatres in the West End.

Jones Malcolm 

Studied at University of London and King’s College, London & RADA. He has worked as an actor, director and teacher and even backstage at the Royal Opera House. He was Workshop and Events Manager at the V&A Theatre Museum in London for 10 years. Since 2009 he has lectured on the V&A Short Course Programme on Theatre and worked on the Art and Expression Programme. He has taught at Rose Bruford College, Mountview Theatre School, The Actors Centre and RADA. He has written material for The National Theatre Education Department and has contributed as a speaker on theatre to many television programmes. He lectures for Road Scholar USA for Theatre groups visiting London and has lectured in America. He also teaches an acting course at New Wimbledon Theatre.

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. Moved to Kosovo in 2006 and there worked with the Ethnological Museum in Prishtina and co-founded ‘The Ideas Partnership’, a charity working on education and cultural heritage projects. Speaks fluent Albanian and has translated two books (the unauthorized biography of Yugoslavia’s longest-held political prisoner, Adem Demaci, and the memoirs of one of the leaders of the 1912 uprising). Also 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). Regular contributor to Radio 4 (Saturday Live, Excess Baggage, From Our Own Correspondent) and the BBC World Service.

From Chartres cathedral to Angkor Wat, religion has been the inspiration for many of the greatest buildings of the world. Indeed, for much of human history, the story of architecture and the story of faith were synonymous.
This lecture explains the architecture of each of the major faith traditions, revealing how it is shaped by their rituals and beliefs. It briefly covers the sacred architecture of such early societies as Mesopotamia, Egypt and the Americas before focusing on the living faiths: the great continuities embodied in the sacred architecture of Buddhism and Hinduism, and the revolutionary changes brought about in monotheistic Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It thus brings fresh insights into some of the most remarkable buildings on the planet.
The aim is to leave the audience understanding why and how (for example) a mosque is different from a synagogue or a church (and how they interrelate), as well as having a ‘big picture’ overview of what is happening where and when in the sacred buildings of planet earth.
It should go without saying that the illustrations cover a sequence of the greatest buildings on the planet. Many are taken from his sumptuous book on the subject, The Secret Language of Sacred Spaces.

John Cannon wrote "Cathedral: the Great English Cathedrals and the World that Made Them" (2007), and presented BBC television's How to Build a Cathedral. The Secret Language of Sacred Spaces: Decoding Temples, Mosques, Churches and other Places of Worship around the World was published in 2013; the Shire book of Medieval Architectural Style the following year. He is currently working on a major book on geology and place in the British landscape. Other publications include numerous works for English Heritage and academic volumes on West Country churches.
 
Part time lecturer in the History of Art at the University of Bristol; holds a degree in the History of Art from the University of Sussex. Lectures, gives study days and leads tours on medieval church art, architecture and history. Lay canon (Keeper of the Fabric) at Bristol Cathedral.

The London Christmas season was invented at Covent Garden. The first theatre on the site was the home of Harlequin and Columbine and 300 years on Harlequin and Columbine are still dancing in “The Nutcracker”.

Most of what we now consider to be quintessential pantomime – principal boy, fairy tales, transformation scenes and the Dame, can be traced back to the operas and ballets put on at Covent Garden during it’s first 200 years. Panto has moved onto the Palladium, but you can still see its basic components in the seasonal operas and ballets the Royal Opera House puts on every year:  Rossini’s “Cenerentola”, for example or Humperdinck’s “Hansel and Gretel”, Tchaikovsky’s “Sleeping Beauty” or Ashton’s “Cinderella”. The repertoire changes every year and this lecture is updated to include current ROH offerings.

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, 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. 

The Borgias, The most infamous family in history ?

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 well known novelist, broadcaster and critic.  She 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 next, In the Name of the Family (to be published in 2017)  completes the story of the Borgia family and the remarkable period of Italian history in which they lived. 

This lecture will follow our AGM.

A Journey Through the  Imperial Wardrobe

This lecture focuses on the costume and dress accessories that would have been worn for formal occasions (Regulated Court Costume), or informally, at the Imperial Court or in Provincial Government during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). Initial consideration will be given to formal, mandated, Court Costume and Insignia of Rank worn by the Imperial Family plus the Civil and Military Officials. The focus will then move to a review of the full scope of the Emperor’s Wardrobe from State Robes, and regalia, through to informal wear Consideration will also be given to robes, and dress accessories, worn on a day to day basis or for special occasions by other members of the Court either in their official capacity or in their private lives. Particular focus will be given to the highly decorative clothing of high ranking Chinese Ladies and will consider the design of items such as informal robes, outerwear, headwear and ornamental accessories. 

David Rosier is a Chartered Insurer by profession and a Fellow of the Assurance Medical Society, with extensive international experience as an author and lecturer in Medical Risk Assessment. He has in excess of 25 years of working and living in Asia. Whilst living in Hong Kong (1991-2004) he assembled a collection of approximately 700, predominately Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), Imperial and related textiles/costume accessories. Past Committee Member of the Hong Kong Textile Society and frequent speaker on Imperial Insignia and Badges of Rank.

Painting The Modern Garden

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

Lydia Bauman was born in Poland and studied for her BA in Fine Art at University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. She has lectured to diverse adult audiences, notably in London's National Gallery and MFA Boston USA. Her book on Great Themes in Art is being considered for publication by Merrell Books for worldwide distribution.

A Load of Old Balls

​According to historian Barbara Tuchman, the invention of the ball ranks as highly as the invention of the wheel. Simon Inglis agrees, especially after spending years delving into cubbyholes at pavilions and museums, in workshops and factories, finding out how these apparently simple objects came into being and how their design and manufacture has evolved. He asks, why are marbles glass? Why did the discovery of gutta percha transform golf? Why were games such as lawn tennis and ping pong made possible only in the mid 19th century? Why did some billiard balls explode, and why are rugby balls such an odd shape? In 1853 the ingredients of one manufacturer's cricket balls were listed as cork, worsted, hemp, brown oats, suet, lard, alum, stale ale and dragon's blood. Can this really be true, or is it, perhaps, just a load of old balls?

Note: Simon will bring along examples of old balls for passing round

Simon Inglis is a writer and historian who specialises in the architecture and heritage of sport and recreation. Since 2004 he has edited the Played in Britain series for English Heritage. Although sport and recreation might seem an unlikely subject for NADFAS, non-sporty types need have no fear. Simon’s themes are architecture, design, heritage and popular culture. After a history degree at University College London, he freelanced for various publications, including the Guardian, Observer and Radio Times. He has curated exhibitions for the Building Centre and the British Council, been a regular contributor to radio and television, has travelled and lectured extensively, and written a number of books. Two were shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year, while another, on British football grounds, was chosen by journalist Frank Keating as the best sports book of the 20th century. A recent highpoint in his work for English Heritage was the listing of a 1970s skatepark in Essex, a world first that made the 10 o'clock news.

The Language of Clothes

The Puritans viewed clothes as dangerous ‘tools of the devil’, whereas Louis XIV of France described fashion as ‘the mirror of history’. Whatever the historical context, clothing and fashion have been used to denote wealth and status, or to differentiate between social groups as fashion statement/antistatement and to display disaffection or affiliation, often interpreted through complex and subtle visual codes. This lecture encompasses a wide historical selection of paintings, male and female clothing, photographs and advertisements – ranging from the medieval sumptuary laws to the ubiquitous designer logo and corporate brand. Extracts from letters, journals and literature will be used throughout. An informative, entertaining and challenging ‘ideas’ lecture aimed at encouraging new ways of looking at clothing as a means of creative self expression in the visual arts. 

Mary Alexander  has thirty years' experience as a lecturer, with a BA in History and History of Art and a MA with distinction in History of Art from University College London. Experience includes public lectures in museums, tutoring for the Open University, visiting lecturer at Christie's Education in London, museum curator at Platt Hall, the Gallery of Costume, Manchester. Now a freelance lecturer to various arts, heritage and antiquarian societies. She also worked in Pentagram design consultancy in London and New York, organising conferences and special events. Author of various articles on design and visual awareness issues, her background combines an unusual blend of academic and visual communications skills. Lectured for ADFAS Australia and New Zealand in 2011 and 2013. Mary is an enthusiastic member and President of Glaven Valley DFAS.

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”. 

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.

Two hundred and fifty years after Antonio Stradivari’s death, his violins and cellos remain the most highly prized instruments in the world. Loved by great musicians and capable of fetching fabulous sums when sold, their tone and beauty are legendary. Every subsequent violin-maker has tried to match them. Not one has succeeded. How can that be? This lecture explores that central mystery by following some of Stradivari’s instruments from his workshop to the present day. It is a story that travels from the salons of Vienna to the concert halls of New York, and from the breakthroughs of Beethoven’s last quartets to the first phonographic recordings. Toby Faber’s book Stradivarius: Five violins, one cello and a genius, was described in The New York Times as ‘more enthralling, earthy and illuminating than any fiction could be.’ The lecture is illustrated with pictures of violins and of key individuals and locations, as well as with some short musical recordings. 

Tony Faber has written two works of narrative history, Stradivarius and Fabergé's Eggs, published by Macmillan in the UK and Random House in the US, and given lectures associated with these two subjects at venues including The Victoria and Albert Museum, Bath Theatre, The Library of Congress and the Huntington Library, as well as a number of literary festivals. 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. Is also non-executive Chairman of its sister company, Faber Music, a trustee of Yale University Press (UK) and a director of the Authors Licensing and Collecting Society.

In 1753 maidservant Elizabeth Canning claimed she was kidnapped by a gypsy Mary Squires in Enfield and held in captivity for 28 days with barely any food or water. Three famous men of the day, including Henry Fielding the author of Tom Jones, became embroiled in the controversy, resulting in acrimonious battles both in journals and in the court room. Through the medium of graphic prints, Elizabeth Canning’s allegations are unravelled. Elizabeth’s story was fictionalised by crime writer Josephine Tey in The Franchise Affair. In this 1948 mystery novel she is portrayed as a deceitful sexual predator. But was she really the perpetrator of a hoax that might result in the hanging of an innocent woman; or instead was she herself a blameless victim of a diabolical crime? 

ian Keable is one of our favourite speakers, a member of the Inner magic Circle and professional magician, he has also written for radio, published a book and collects eigteenth and nineteenth century prints and books.

This lecture is a persuasive introduction to buying antiques and integrating them into todays homes. The state of the antiques market and the different meanings of the word "value" are considered and we will 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 the History of Art and Antiques beofre joining Bonhams as a porter and junor cataloguer. After moving to Sothebys he became a specialist in the Collections Department and then set up the ground breaking ebay Live Auctions. Since 2002 he has co-authored several books, set up a publishing company and become the miscellaneous expert on the Antiques Roadshow.

There's more to the world of street art than Banksy. Hidden Canvases is a beginners guide to the biggest art movement since Pop Art. From train writing in New York to the interactive technology that brings murals to life, the concept of un-commissioned public art is a very different beast.

This lecture explores the key stages in street art's growth examining the different styles and elemets that comprise the scene with no rules. 

Doug Gillen is heavily involved in documenting the street scene in London and abroad through his project Fifth Wall TV and can offer a genuine insight into this world.

PLEASE NOTE THE DATE AND DAY. THIS MEETING IS ON MONDAY 11th DECEMBER AND NOT THURSDAY

The Christmas tree is arguably the most iconic aspect of our midwinter celebrations, yet how much do we actually know about its origins and history. Peter Medhurst delves into the past – as far back as the Book of Genesis – in order to tell the story of this remarkable ‘German toy’, as Dickens described it. Music performed includes: Adam lay ybounden, Jesus Christ the Apple Tree – Elizabeth Postern, O Tannenbaum, O Little Town of Bethlehem, O Holy Night – Adolphe Adam.

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. 

Come along and enjoy the talk, the music and a mince pie with your coffee!

In the mediaeval period highly distinctive styles of architecture developed in remote Transylvania and Moldavia. This lecture first illustrates the fine Gothic churches that the Saxon settlers built in Transylvania and survive in their elegant towns and, uniquely, behind formidable fortifications in their villages. The main part of the lecture depicts the ‘Painted Monasteries’ of Moldavia, famous for their frescoes that stem from the Orthodox Byzantine tradition, and for the lovely architectural ensembles. The frescoes cover the entire outside walls of the churches and still maintain their wonderfully vivid colours and details. All this is set in the context of Romania’s landscape and history. 

John Osborne graduated in Classics at Cambridge University and taught Classics at Marlborough College for over thirty years. He worked for the British Council in Iran and Turkey, and lectures in Islamic Civilisation.

The AGM will be followed by cheese and wine.

Our lecturer today is Chief Executive of the Royal School of Needlework, based at Hampton Court Palace, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and of the Chartered Institute of Marketing. She has a longstanding interest in textiles, especially colour, and published her first book, The Story of Colour in Textiles (Bloomsbury) in 2013.

What do we mean by jewellery? What does it mean to different societies across time and across the world? This lecture takes a number of themes in order to expand the concept of jewellery and examine the different reasons why people wear it. Everyone decorates the body, but there are different notions of how to do so and which parts to decorate. In many societies jewellery serves as vital protection against evil spirits. It can be a powerful vehicle of communication, indicating the wearer’s preoccupations, their religion or ethnic group. It can be a keepsake of a loved one, or a memorial to the dead. And it can also be a work of art in its own right harnessing all the .skills of the goldsmith, gem-setter, or enameller. Based on the collections of the British Museum, where the speaker has worked for 40 years, this new thought-provoking lecture reveals how jewellery has been worn and used, and takes you from ancient burial ornaments by anonymous masters to the big names of the modern world.

Judy Rudoe has been a curator at the British Museum since 1974. She specialises in jewellery, and in 19th-20th century decorative arts. Author of Cartier 1900-1939 (BM 1997) and organiser of the Cartier exhibition at the BM, co-author of the Catalogue of the Hull Grundy Gift of Jewellery (BM 1984), contributor to the Catalogue of Micromosaics in the Gilbert Collection (2000). Her latest book, Jewellery in the Age of Victoria, co-authored with Charlotte Gere, was published in 2010 and won the 2011 William Berger Prize for British Art History. She is a Freeman of the Goldsmiths' Company and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.

The world’s first underground railway has a wonderful heritage of architecture, ingenious design, powerful advertising posters and unique calligraphy. In this talk we plot the early development of the Underground, examine the legacy of Frank Pick and Charles Holden, look at some of the iconic posters, and celebrate the award winning architecture of the modern Tube in the Jubilee Line Extension. We’ll also take a peek at some of the forthcoming Crossrail stations, designed by some of the world’s top architects. 

Ian Swankie describes himself as a Londoner with a passion for art and architecture. He is an official guide at Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Guildhall Art Gallery and St Paul's Cathedral, and gives regular tours at each venue. In 2012 he established a weekly independent art lecture group in Richmond and gives talks on a variety of subjects.

Sarah Searight Lush is an historian and journalist specialising for many years in the Middle East and has published extensively with books and articles on the subject. Her more recent interest is in the art history of the Islamic World and in 1990-92 achieved her MA in Islamic Art, London University. Her latest book, 'Lapis Lazuli: in pursuit of a celestial stone', was published in 2010. 

This talk follows the travels of this precious stone from Afghanistan through burials in the ancient world, in wall paintings in medieval Byzantine churches, ending with early Renaissance Madonnas robed in ultramarine ground as pigment from lapis lazuli. 

Ian Pickford is a Freeman of the Goldsmiths' Company and of the City of London. He lectures to the University of London, University of Surrey, V&A, National Trust, The Art Fund and broadcasts on both television and radio. 

Caroline Rayman has lectured for many years to universities and art organisations in America and on cruise boats. She was an official guide at the British Museum and has published articles on samplers. 

 This talk is a story of the power and influence of 'Royal Favourites' through the ages from Fair Rosamond Clifford right through to the 20th Century.

This lecture explains what has been going on in British art since 1945, when Francis Bacon caused ‘total consternation’ with his raw and visceral canvasses. His work was part of a wider phenomenon called the ‘Geometry of Fear’ by a leading critic of the day. From that point, the talk tracks key moments in British art decade by decade, through the curious mixture of modernism and pastoralism which is associated with the Festival of Britain; on to the explosion of Pop Art and Conceptualism in the 1960s and 70s, through to the 1980s and 90s, which gave us the notorious Sensation exhibition and the Turner Prize, and on to the present day. However, despite all these highly public shocks and upsets, figurative painters like Francis Bacon and Lucian Freud were quietly getting on with it in the background, and one of the great stories of post-war British art is the continuing strength and vigour of that tradition. 

Mars and Muses

Armour was one of the great Renaissance art-forms, but today it is usually overlooked by art historians, scholars and enthusiasts. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries almost all of the richest, most powerful noblemen in Europe could be counted as dedicated patrons of the armourer’s art. This was an intensely personal art, both expressive and decorative. Its essence was the creation of a living sculpture, a process which demanded not only fantastic skill in the sculpting of iron and steel, but also mastery of all decorative techniques available to the Renaissance metalworker. The achievements of virtuoso master armourers like Kolman Helmschmid, Konrad Seusenhofer, Filippo Negroli, Pompeo della Cesa and Jacob Halder were not however just about splendour and richness. They also embodied more complex messages, about status and the social order, divine power, and attitudes and identities. 

Toby is Curator of Arms and Armour at the Wallace Collection in London, Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and an internationally acknowledged expert on Medieval and Renaissance weapons. 

A seasonal end to our year of lectures. Hillary Guise will talk about "The Ox and the Ass, the silent watchers at the crib", a very appropriate talk for the time of year and one I'm sure we will all enjoy.

Unfortunately Maggie Cambell Pedersen, who was due to give the previosly advertised lecture, is unable to come on 15th Dcember due to illness but Amanda has manged to find an excellent replacement in Hilary.

Hope to see you there to enjoy both the talk and the mince pies!

This talk combines the lives of the Astors, the Sackville Wests and the Rothschilds and their family history with the stories of the gardens they have all created. 

This morning is not to be missed with our favourite Enfield speaker Frank Bayford talking on a local subject and followed by cheese and wine.

In 1953  HM the Queen Mother described the Art Fund as "the greatest collectors of all time". This lecture takes us behind the scenes at the Art Fund and gives a lively account of its history and achievements.

Deborah Lambert appears regularly as a furniture specialsit on the Antiques Road Show and in this lecture will look at the room dedicated to eating which evolved out of the needs of society. 

The presence of such a room relates to social class, formal versus informal meals and public versus private eating. Has eating in the kitchen or in front of the television made the dining room redundant? This talk looks at the development of the dining room, from the Middle Ages to our own time, and explores the fascinating development of the furniture and furnishing associated with changing tastes, customs and fashions.

The mosaics of Ravenna were created during great political turmoil when in the fifth and sixth centuries invaders played havoc with the western Russian empire. In spite of this artists and church leaders created buildings of astonishing beauty.

This lecture looks at Galla Placida, San Vitale, and the Orthodox Baptistery.

This lecture is based on the Islamic manuscript, the Padshaahnana (chronicle of the King of the World) which is the unique official history of the Mughal Emporor who ruled india from 1628 to 1658. He is best remembered for building the Taj Mahal for his favourite wife, Mumtaz Mahal. 

The lavishly illustrated manuscript is now in the Royal Library at Windsor Castle having been given to George III in 1797 by the ruler of the north Indian state of Oudh.

Since its foundation in 1925, Faber and Faber has built a reputation as one of London's most important literary publishing houses. This lecture traces its history through it's illustrations, covers and designs. 

It has employed some of our most celebrated artists as cover designers - from Rex Whistler to Damian Hirst and the talk will look at some of the concepts behind their designs as well as the adverts and other illustrations.

The world of maps extends from BC 3000 to Harry Beck's London Underground map of 1931. In between hand drawn 15th century Portolan sea charts have been superseded by printed maps, initially by 2nd century Ptolemaic maps which could now finally be published.

England plays an important part in these developments and one we shall explore in this talk looking at Christopher Saxton, who in 1579 was the first cartographer to publish a regional atlas of any country, as well as the advances made by John Speed and John Ogilvy amongst others.

A history of wine, looking at it's rituals and vessels along with much else.

This description of medieval London was made -rather surprisingly - by the Scottish poet William Dunbar a member of the Scotch delegation sent to London in 1502 to negotiate the marriage of Margaret Tudor to James IV of Scotland. London was the only city in England that could bear comparison with the great European cities.

A surprisingly large amount of its medieval heritage still survives and shows how the Plantagenet Kings struggled to compete with their European equivalents. This lecture will illustrate the resuts of this competition and the truly extraordianry Gothic world it inspired.

The history of magic through art and pictures.

A light hearted talk for our pre Christmas event. Please note the date and join us for coffee and mince pies at 10am prior to the talk.

A fascinating talk on this tortured hero who lived in troubled times.

This meeting will start with our AGM and then retired registrar Richard Selby will give his hilarious talk. This will be followed by refreshemnts.

In 1848 seven young men- mostly artists- formed a secret brotherhood with the aim of reforming British art. Patrick Connor will expose their secrets.

Royal Ceremonies from Coronations to Jubilees are highlighted in this talk. From the orb to the sceptre it will examine the significance of the symbols of sovreignty. It includes the Orders of Chivalry, investitures, the annual Garter ceremony and why St. George became our patron saint.

The developments in British painting from the days of the Pre-Raphaelites to the aftermath of world war two.

This talk looks particularly at British art from the fertile late Victorian period to the second world war and the way developments in Paris were received by the London art world.

The arrival of moving pictures in Britain, by one of our most popular speakers.

The History of Staffordshire Figures from 1750-1890

Diana Lloyd will begin with the naive handmade figures of the early 18th century and go through to the notorious flatbacks swamping the market in the Victorian era.

Harry Murphy worked for the Falcon studio, where he designed and created an enormous amount of silverware as well as some truly startling gold, silver and enamel jewellery inspired by nature, architecture, the Ballet Russes and the vibrancy of the Jazz age.

Illustrated with images from Oxford to Afghanistan, and brushing shoulders with splendid characters like Thomas Howard the Earl of Arundel, George Villiers the Duke of Buckingham, John Tradescant (Elder and Younger), and Sir Arthur Evans, this talk will tell the fascinating tale of how the Ashmolean acquired some of the finest Classical artworks outside Greece and Italy. Moving across sites in Greece and Rome, it will conclude with a virtual tour of many of the museum’s most intriguing artefacts.

Andrew Davies, author and broadcaster, explains how our Christmas traditions have evolved and how, contrary to popular myth,the Victorians thoroughly amused themselves, especially at Christmas.

Yasha Beresiner was born in Turkey in 1940 and is a Law Graduate of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1968). He moved to England in 1969 and after an extended career as a legal consultant was appointed a Director of Stanley Gibbons Ltd, the stamp magnates. In 1983 he set up his own international collectors' company, InterCol London (www.intercol.co.uk). He is a qualified City of London Guide (Editor of their quarterly publication) and a Past Master (2001/2) of the Worshipful Company of Makers of Playing Cards, founded in 1628. He is an accredited NADFAS lecturer and a prolific author. In addition to a dozen books (Andre Deutsche, David and Charles, etc) on a range of subjects, his articles have appeared in specialised collectors' and other magazines throughout Europe, and the Americas. His book 'English County Maps' won the British Library Association award: 'Best Reference work for 1988'.

Launce Gribbin is a painter and a lecturer in the history of art and architecture. Early success as a professional painter led on to the study of Art History at the Courtauld Institute, after which he worked at the V&A and the London College of Printing and then as a tutor in Sotheby's Department of Educational Studies. He continues to lecture on a wide range of topics. A recent return to painting has seen the creation of this web site - it will grow over time to showcase more of Launce's work and act as a resource for those wishing to learn more about the background to his lectures.