This presentation tells of the Mozart Family’s residence in London (1764-5) during which time the 8-year-old Wolfgang Amadeus - already a prolific composer - amazed the guests of George III and performed musical tricks in pubs (and was even the subject of medical research).  All this is described with surprising images of 18th century Chelsea and of Mozart’s earliest musical handwriting.  Furthermore, Dr Griffiths illustrates his talk at the piano with explanations and performances of over a dozen of Mozart’s witty miniatures.  The equally-astonishing Polonaise Mélancolique by Mozart’s own child prodigy Franz Xaver (whom he never knew) brings the presentation to an emotional conclusion.  N.B. This is the ideal introduction to the inimitable style of Griffith’s presentations where the experienced concert-goer and the musical new-comer are informed and entertained in equal measure.

According to one leading architect, ‘the modern architectural drawing is interesting, the photograph is magnificent, the building is an unfortunate but necessary stage between the two’.  Architecture + Photography = Art introduces photographers who crystallised the architects’ vision in images that are both works of art in their own right and shape our opinion of the buildings they depict.  These photographers include Dell and Wainwright from Britain, Julius Shulman in the United States and Lucien Hervé in France.

The lecture also examines photographers who recorded rural churches, barns and cottages to create a lyrical vision of Britain.  Prominent in this group are Edwin Smith, Frederick Evans and Eric de Maré, a friend and drinking companion of John Betjeman and widely considered to have been the poet’s favourite photographer.

PLEASE NOTE THIS LECTURE HAS HAD TO BE CANCELLED

PLEASE NOTE, THIS LECTURE WILL TAKE PLACE IN THE OLD WINDSOR CLUB

The address is 46a, St. Luke’s Road, Old Windsor, SL4 2QJ

From the mid-19th Century onwards there was a revolution in the arts against what we see as the soulless products of the machine age.  This revolution produced ‘passionate potters’ whose inspirations and products are the subject of this lecture.  William de Morgan, William Morris’ lifelong friend, inspired by the medieval period and the Near East produced, through experimentation, stunning ‘Persian’ lustre glazes.  The Martin Brothers, in an extraordinary collaboration, made some of the most imaginative (some say bizarre) salt-glazed pots and sculptures of the Victorian and Edwardian era.  Sir Edmund Elton, the ‘potter baronet’, married pre-Columbian forms with startling metallic glazes, all created at his ancestral home with the assistance of a flower-pot thrower.  And the influence of Bernard Leach, the father of British studio pottery, who straddled the worlds of Medieval England and the Far East, is still felt in the passionate potters of today.

The Wallace Collection, a national museum containing an outstanding array of paintings, furniture, porcelain, arms and armour, and other works of art, was brought together by five generations of one family between about 1760 and 1880.  All the Founders were remarkable men in their own right, but the greatest collectors were the 4th Marquess of Hertford, and his illegitimate son, Sir Richard Wallace, who lived most of their lives in Paris.  This lecture tells the fascinating story of the Wallace Collection’s formation, and also presents many of its finest treasures.

From celestial heralds of medieval art, to the surrealist beings in Marc Chagall’s work, the angel has always held a fascination for Western artists.  Over the centuries angel imagery has evolved from the ethereal to more naturalistic depictions, paralleling society’s progression from faith in the unseen, to a world dominated by scientific explanation.  Angels are usually associated with beauty, but more frightening depictions also exist.  This talk considers a myriad of angels in different guises and looks at many interpretations including Bernini’s highly erotic ‘Ecstasy of St Teresa’, the classical beauty of William-Adolphe Bougereau’s angels and Brueghel’s frenzied painting ‘The Fall of the Rebel Angels’

The lecture will be preceded by seasonal refreshments, mince pies, wine and other drinks

The Spanish artist Joaquín Sorolla (1863-1923) was a phenomenal international success in his own lifetime and held an exhibition in London in the early summer of 1908.  Just over a century later, 18 March - 7 July 2019, his works were shown to a British audience again in the National Gallery in London.

Sorolla is sometimes known as a Spanish Impressionist, as many of his paintings are permeated by colour and light.  He was grounded in Spanish traditions of realism, but was influenced by Impressionism and open to the ideas of the contemporary avant-garde.  His paintings of fishermen, his beach scenes, portraits and regional studies of Spain were eagerly sought after by European and American collectors.  Today his work is less well known, especially in Britain, though occasionally one of his paintings comes up for sale and hits the headlines.  His passion was painting sunlit scenes, so there is a wonderful optimism about his works.  Sorolla’s former home and studio, one of Madrid’s most popular small museums, is a refreshing oasis in the busy capital.

In this talk Andrew shows how the rise of Cinema and Hollywood had such an important impact on fashion and jewellery design.  From Marlene Dietrich to Grace Kelly, he guides you thorough the Screen Goddesses and how they were portrayed.  He discusses that with the development of advertising, labour-saving machines and leisure time, people had more opportunities to enjoy themselves and spend money on the finer things in life and later how political events influenced what was worn.  He also shows how the Edwardian and Art Deco styles did not in fact end with the outbreak of WW2, rather, they slowly combined to flower finally in the late 1940s and 1950s with Christian Dior’s ‘New Look’.

This lecture will present a comprehensive survey of the life and the development of the work of Charles H. Mackie, from his early struggles as an artist up to his final recognition as a members of the Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour.  The people he met - Gauguin, Vuillard, Hornel - and the places he painted - Kirkcudbright, Normandy, Venice - form the core of the lecture.

The illustrations cover all aspects of his artistic output- watercolour, oil, tooled leatherwork, woodblock prints and sculpture.  A journey with this ‘forgotten man’ of Scottish art will provide evidence of his skill as a colourist and reclaim his place in Art’s Pantheon.

Pat Clark has been a teacher of history and politics for over 30 years and latterly, an Inspector and Headteacher of Secondary school.  From 2004 to 2006 she was appointed as a VSO Education Adviser to NGO in Cambodia where she delivered lectures to Khmer colleagues, fellow volunteers and representatives from the Ministry of Education. Following the publication of her book "People, Places and Piazzas. The Life and Art of Charles Mackie" she has lectured to audiences  throughout Scotland and has been invited to deliver the Annual Edinburgh Philosophical Institution Lecture in May 2019.

Leonardo’s images of women whether Madonnas, mistresses or wealthy members of society are amongst the most renowned works of art of the Italian Renaissance.  This lecture, designed to celebrate the 500th anniversary of his death, will study his revolutionary rendering of the female figure and how he harnessed the interplay of light and shadow to produce images that combine the spiritual with the sensual, the mystical with the mysterious.

THIS LECTURE WILL BE PRECEDED BY OUR AGM AT 1.30pm

Shirley graduated from the University of East Anglia with a first class honours degree in the History of Art, specialising in the Italian and Northern Renaissance. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a part-time lecturer for the University of East Anglia and for the Department of Continuing Education of the University of Cambridge. She has run study days and certificate courses as well as residential weekend courses. She lectures to the Art Fund and individual clubs and societies. She is particularly keen to set the art and architecture of the period in the context of the society for which it was produced.

Victorian designer William Morris was a man of many faces.  He is probably best known today as the creator of wallpaper, fabrics and stained glass windows, but he was also a poet, philosopher, typographer and socialist.  What is less well known is his links to the richest copper and arsenic mine in Europe and his toxic green wallpapers are said to have poisoned thousands of people across England.

Geri is a former Fleet Street journalist and film publicist. She has a first class honours degree in History and Theology, a Masters in History of Art from the Courtauld Institute and a Theology doctorate from Roehampton University in London. She has been lecturing for the past eleven years both in the UK and internationally. She is also principal lecturer on the The Arts Society South West Area’s History of Art course and is an Honorary Research Fellow at Roehampton University and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

There are many illustrious gardens on the shores of Lakes Como and Maggiore in the mountainous far north of Italy.  Those included in this lecture include a 16th century parterre and water staircase; a baroque garden in the middle of a lake; two gardens made by rival Napoleon grandees; and a garden created by two Edwardian romantics as a theatre for sharing their love of art and nature.  These achievements and others are set in a climate ideal for garden-making among some of the world’s noblest scenery, where Wordsworth, Liszt and Bellini found inspiration.  It could work for you.

Steven is an independent landscape consultant specialising in historic gardens and architecture; a freelance lecturer, including Universities of Bristol and Oxford; a specialist tour leader and lecturer in Britain, Ireland, France, Germany and Italy. ADFAS lecture tour of Australia in 2010. He is also a writer and broadcaster on historic gardens and related topics. Steven Desmond's book "Gardens of the Italian Lakes", with photography by Marianne Majerus, is published by Frances Lincoln.

This lecture starts with an examination of evolving attitudes in India (as well as in the UK) towards the British Empire, and towards the buildings which survive as testament to its achievements.  A whistle stop tour is then made of the very best colonial buildings in Chennai (Madras), Kolkata (Calcutta), Mumbai (Bombay), Delhi and elsewhere.

In the final third the lecturer focuses in on Bombay, reflecting on his experience of having masterminded a British government backed project to restore that city’s magnificent George Gilbert Scott designed university buildings.  The telling of this mid-Victorian building’s story - its design (in England), construction, history and, of course, its restoration - provide useful start-points from which to consider the broader historical, cultural and architectural context.

Bombay’s economic boom of the 1860s coincided with the high point of the Gothic Revival: nowhere else in the world can claim to have as magnificent an assemblage of Gothic Revival buildings.  Whilst examining the city’s colonial architecture study is made of the carvings of Bombay’s Jeejeebhoy School of Art, whose architectural Sculpture Department was - for a short time - headed up by John Lockwood Kipling, father of Rudyard Kipling.

The story of the award-winning project to restore the University of Mumbai’s Gothic Revival buildings provides an opportunity to touch upon philosophical approaches to conservation as well as traditional repair techniques. Account is also given of the work undertaken by those who took time away from their respective Cathedral workshops in the UK to transfer knowledge and skill to their Indian counterparts.

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

We look in detail at the human stories and the evidence pro and con in some notoriously undecided disputes.  The Metropolitan Museum called a press conference to denounce their own ancient bronze horse as a forgery, then exonerated it…almost.  The Turin Shroud is a fascinating object whatever your take on it.  The Getty Museum frankly label the Kouros they bought as either Greek from the 5th century BC, or as a modern forgery - we just don’t know.  Disputes are erupting with such frequency that the most topical cases we look at by the time this lecture gets delivered may not yet have hit the headlines.

David studied History at Oxford, and from 1968-82 worked for Nottingham Castle Museum. From 1982-98, he was a Lecturer in Museum Studies and Art History at the University of Manchester. In 1997 he published a book about museum practice with Manchester University Press, "Exhibiting Authenticity".

This lecture celebrates the 200th Anniversary of the births of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert who were first cousins and born just three months apart in 1819.  Their shared enthusiasm for art and music endured throughout the twenty-two years of their marriage and they demonstrated their love through the works of art and jewellery they gave each other for birthdays, Christmases and anniversaries.  Victoria and Albert understood and appreciated sculpture more than any of their predecessors since Charles I.  They furnished and extended Buckingham Palace, made significant changes to Windsor Castle and commissioned three other royal residences, Balmoral, Sandringham and Osborne - the single most important example of their shared taste.  Theirs was a partnership of patronage by a monarch and her consort which is unique in the history of the British monarchy.

Barbara grew up in Eton with Windsor Castle as part of her daily view.  She graduated with an Honours Degree in History and taught History for 15 years before qualifying as a Blue Badge Tourist Guide.  She is a lecturer, examiner and course director on Blue Badge training courses and an acknowledged expert on royalty and on Windsor Castle.  She has been the Site Liaison Representative at Windsor Castle for the Blue Badge Guides’ Associations since 1990.  She is a rota guide in the British Museum, the Houses of Parliament and the Albert Memorial and conducts historically-themed walking tours in Windsor for Windsor Festival and further education groups.

Nicholas was the Greek Bishop of Myra, a 4th century port in Anatolia.  Following his death, his legendary generosity established him as the principal gift-giving saint.  Also the patron 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.

Christopher Bradley is an 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. He 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. As a film producer and cameraman he has made documentaries for the BBC, National Geographic TV and Channel 4.

Paul Nash and C.R.W.Nevinson were two of the most significant artists to paint the soldiers and battlefields of World War I.  Walter Sickert described Nevinson’s painting La Mitrailleuse (‘The Machine-Gun’, 1916, Tate Britain) as probably ‘the most authoritative and concentrated utterance on war in the history of painting’.  Another contemporary wrote that Nash’s shattered landscapes seemed to have been ‘torn from the sulphurous rim of the inferno itself’.  This lecture explores the artistic development of both men, and their distinct but related responses to representing an extraordinarily horrific and very modern war in paint.

David Haycock read Modern History at the University of Oxford, and has an MA in the History of Art and a PhD in British History. He is the author of a number of books, including Paul Nash (2002), A Crisis of Brilliance: Five Young British Artists and the Great War (2009) and Augustus John: Drawn from Life (2018); he has lectured widely at galleries and museums in the UK, including Tate Britain, the National Portrait Gallery, the Royal Watercolour Society and Pallant House.

The reputation of Japan as a country fabulously rich in silver and gold reached the west in the 14th century through the writings of the Venetian merchant and explorer, Marco Polo.  Gold was used generously to adorn Buddhist icons in Japan from the sixth century when Buddhism was introduced from Korea, and for centuries gold was considered to be the most appropriate precious material for decorating Buddhist halls and statues.  The perception of gold as a sacred material underwent a radical change in the sixteenth century when newly powerful warrior rulers began to decorate their castles with magnificent screens and wall paintings with gold-leaf.  This lecture examines the significance of gold in Japanese Art as the symbol of the sacred on one hand and the symbol of wealth and power on the other.

Dr Meri Arichi studied Art History in London and Florence, and worked at Christie’s from 1989 to 1993. She has been teaching History of Japanese Art in the Department of History of Art and Archaeology at SOAS as a Teaching Fellow since 2007. She has also run courses at the Birkbeck College, V&A, British Museum, and the Courtauld Institute of Art Summer School. She has led tours to Japan and lectured on cruises.

Burlington House on London’s Piccadilly has been the home of the Royal Academy of Arts since 1868. Although the Academy was already 100 years old when it took up residence, it is not commonly known that the building has a long and fascinating history of its own. This talk focuses on the origins of Burlington House, from construction in the 1660s for a   courtier to King Charles II; re-fashioning as a Palladian mansion for Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington; its association with architects such as William Kent and Sebastiano Ricci; further redevelopment by the Cavendish family during the Regency period, and its ultimate role as the home of the United Kingdom’s leading ‘society for promoting the Arts of Design’.

Stephen Richardson is an art historian with a particular interest in the art and architecture of the Georgian period. He holds a Masters Degree in Decorative Arts and Historic Interiors from UCL and has published a number of articles on country house visiting, which is a favourite pastime. He is a guide at both the Royal Academy of Arts and at the V&A, where he describes himself as a 'creature' of the British Galleries.

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.

The meeting will start with our Annual General Meeting, please note, at 1.30pm

We welcome our very own Chairman as today's lecturer. Roger's background is very much a musical one, from chorister at Wells Cathedral School, choral scholar at Magdalen College Oxford, professional singer and teacher in London to Director of Music at one of Edinburgh's foremost schools. He has an honours degree in English from Oxford and a degree in Music gained while he was teaching in London, and in addition to being Chairman of our Society Roger is President Emeritus of the Stoke Poges Society.  

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

Caroline Shenton is an archivist, historian and author. She was formerly Director of the Parliamentary Archives at Westminster and a senior archivist at the National Archives at Kew. A Fellow of the Society of Archivists and of the Royal Historical Society, she has appeared on national TV and radio, and is also a book reviewer for The Spectator. Her first popular history book ‘The Day Parliament Burned Down’ won the Political Book of the Year Award in 2013.

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 specialising in the domestic and social life of the past. He graduated with a First Class Honours degree from London University. He is an experienced lecturer and occasional broadcaster on a broad range of topics with a particular interest in architecture, interior decoration and costume.  He writes privately commissioned histories of houses and is a regular obituary contributor to The Times and The Daily Telegraph.

For thousands of years the mystery of the Golden Section has inspired thinkers from all disciplines - artists and architects, mathematicians and musicians. Discover the secrets of its sacred geometry and beauty within creations from the classical to contemporary.

Alexandra Epps’ background is in design. She holds a BA from St Martin’s School of Art and a PhD from the London School of Printing. For many years she practised as a graphic designer, running her own design consultancy. She is an official guide at Tate Modern & Tate Britain, and a qualified guide to the City of London.

When Capability Brown refused a fee of £1,000 to work in Ireland because “he had not yet finished England”, it marked the high tide of the English Landscape Movement.  His birth in 1716 signalled the end of the Baroque age and his death in 1783 heralded all the excesses of Romanticism. The intervening years witnessed the greatest contribution Britain has made to art.

The death of formality and the decline of baroque architecture went hand in hand with a change in the political climate following the deaths of Queen Anne in 1714 and Louis XIV in 1715.  This is the age of the Grand Tour and the Whig party, of Lord Burlington, William Kent, and Neo-Palladianism.  It was the Augustan Age, with Britain almost unconsciously trembling on the edge of Empire.

Brown’s important years as head gardener at Stow, where he learnt from both Cobham and Kent formed the basis of his independent practice based in Hampshire.  From here Brown surveyed and transformed England from Milton Abbey to Alnwick Castle.

The change in taste and mood, driven by the increasing fondness for Gothic architecture and Romantic wilderness and  disorder in landscaping, caused Brown’s work to fall from favour as dull and formulaic. Landscapes like Repton ushered in a revival of formation so the wheel turned full circle.

James Bolton has been a NADFAS lecturer for over 20 years. He specialises in gardens and holds a Diploma from the Inchbald School of Design, where he has also been Faculty Director in Design History. He organises garden study days and tours to the best private gardens in the UK, Italy, France and South Africa. In 2000 he published ‘Garden Maria’ about garden ornaments.

Artists have always used jokes to make serious statements – about themselves, about the world, about the nature of art. This lecture looks at artists’ jokes through the ages, from medieval monks doodling graffiti in the margins of manuscripts to Banksy turning supermarket walls into social satire. Caravaggio put his own face on Goliath’s severed head as an apology for a racy lifestyle, Michelangelo hid a self-portrait on the hide of St Bartholomew on the Sistine ceiling to express the agony of creation. When Van Gogh attacked formal art education and Salvador Dali got at Picasso, they did it in paint. Trompe l'oeil, parody, visual puns, the moustache on the Mona Lisa - all in fun, all deadly serious: artists' jokes tell you a lot once you know.

Susie Harries specialises in 20th century culture and the arts. She lectures widely and has published books on official war artists, opera and the composer Elizabeth Lutyens. In 2011 she published a biography of Sir Nikolaus Pevsner.

The success of Julian Fellowes’s Downton Abbey demonstrates our continued fascination with ‘the way we used to live’, the labours of those ‘below stairs’ arousing as much curiosity as the lives of the privileged. The Victorians transformed Christmas into the most important annual celebration, from inventing the greetings card to introducing the turkey. It became a family holiday; the preparation and eating of the feast, decorations and gift giving, singing carols and parlour games, all were essential to the celebrations. Many attribute this change to Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, who allegedly introduced the bedecked Christmas tree from his German homeland. Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol espoused and popularised Victorian family values, charity and goodwill, peace and happiness, which encapsulate the spirit of Christmas. Using contemporary images this lecture charts how our modern Christmas festivities were invented by the Victorians.

Your Committee warmly invite you to join them for a buffet lunch - wine and soft drinks will be served - and we shall have a Raffle.  The lunch will will start at 1.10pm

Anne Anderson graduated in art history and archaeology from Leicester University in 1978 and initially worked as an archaeologist. Between 1993 and 2007 she was senior lecturer on the Fine Arts Valuation course at Southampton Solent University. Currently she is research fellow at Exeter University and a consultant for Leighton House, the west London studio-home of the Victorian artist Frederick, Lord Leighton.

Amid the turmoil of the Russian Revolution, a new avant-garde art was developing, and artistic battle lines were drawn - Chagall versus Malevich, expressionism versus Constructivism - and new collaborations emerged. From the Black Square to Tatlin's 'monument without a beard', to Soviet Socialist realism under Stalin, discover what made this period so fascinating and vital.

(This lecture will link with the Royal Academy's Spring 2017 exhibition on the topic, running from 11th February to 17th April 2018)

Maria-Anne Mancio lectures widely on art history, and runs overseas art history study courses. She trained as an artist and holds a PhD in art and critical theory from the University of Sussex.

This lecture looks principally at the changes to the famous City of London skyline viewed from across the River Thames. It first gives a thumbnail sketch of how the City has grown through the centuries. Secondly  it concentrates on 20th and 21st centuries and looks at how new tall buildings are set to change the skyline even further.

We begin with the thriving Roman port when the forum and City wall would have dominated the skyline; and we note how the medieval cathedral of St Paul’s towered over 100 parish churches. Dramatic pictures of the Great Fire in the mid 17th century indicate how London would change from a timber medieval city, with its famous London Bridge, to a brick-built city dominated by Sir Christopher Wren’s classical St Paul’s and its great Baroque dome. Victorian icons such as the picturesque Palace of Westminster upriver and the famous Tower Bridge, seen under construction from early photographs, bring the first part of the lecture to a close.

In the second section we note how the growing scale of buildings at the turn of 20th century was limited in height by restrictions based on how high a fireman’s ladder could reach, 100 ft, and the challenge which this presented to architects. We consider the many changes to the London skyline as a result of wartime damage, and how Richard Seifert’s designs in 1960s and 70s, particularly his prominent NatWest Tower (now Tower 42), altered the skyline. Finally, we look at the new generation of tall buildings in London, the first of which has been Foster Associates’ ‘Gherkin’, and how London’s skyline is set to become even more striking with such 21st century icons as the ‘Shard of Glass’, the ‘Cheesegrater’ and the ‘Walkie-Talkie’. 

Anthea Streeter’s special interest is the architecture and design of the 20th Century. She studied Fine and Decorative Arts in London and continued her studies at Harvard University. Since returning from America she has taught on courses in a variety of locations including Oxford and London.

Widely known for his appearances dressed as his feminine alter ego, Claire, Grayson Perry RA is now a core part of the art establishment. Ten years after winning the Turner Prize he gave the brilliant BBC Reith Lecture in 2013. His works of ceramics, textiles, tapestries and prints are highly sought after. Often controversial, he is able to tackle difficult subjects in a poignant yet witty way. This talk will examine Grayson Perry’s works, his exciting and thought provoking exhibitions, and we’ll look at the character inside the flamboyant frocks.

Ian Swankie is a Londoner with a passion for art and architecture. He is an official guide at Tate Modern and Tate Britain, the Guildhall Art Gallery and St Paul’s Cathedral and gives regular tours at each venue.

The lecture will be preceded by the Society AGM at 1.30pm

This lecture tells the story of the outstanding artistry and craftsmanship that rescued key examples of our architectural heritage. We open with an account of how the great dome of St Paul’s Cathedral was found to be close to collapse in the 1920s, and how its restoration inspired one of the most extraordinary drawings ever produced of a British building. Other examples include the rescue, after fire, of key areas of Castle Howard, the setting for 'Brideshead Revisited', and the inspired reconstruction of one of London’s smallest, and oldest, medieval churches in 2002.

Brian Stater's chief interests are in photography, architecture and history. He has been a NADFAS lecturer since 2003. An exhibition of his photographs has been staged at University College London, and he has recently begun to work with a pre-war Leica camera in an attempt to gain a deeper understanding of the skills of some of the great photographers of the past.

Soon to celebrate his 80th birthday, David Hockney remains one of Britain’s most prolific, diverse and celebrated artists. In the 1960s, as a student and already an increasingly successful painter, he was radical and controversial, always trying out new techniques and subject matter.  The first British artist to act like a pop star, famous from the moment he graduated from the Royal College of Art as gold medal-winner in 1962, he went on to make art on an international stage that stretched from the glamour of California to the sweep of his home Yorkshire landscape.  He attracted record crowds to his 2011-12 Royal Academy of Arts exhibition which showed him still experimenting in style and media and is the subject of a major retrospective at Tate Britain in 2017.

Sarah Stopford is a Guide and Lecturer at Tate Britain & Tate Modern. She studied Art History as part of her first degree at Harvard, and has a degree in English from Cambridge. Her special interest is in British and post-1900 art, and the connection between literature and the visual arts.

Ha-has, serpentine walks, artificial lakes, grottoes, ice-houses, hermitages (and their occupants), devices for mowing and tree-moving, surprise views and instant ruins: these were among the elements of the landscape garden, which - we can fairly claim - was a great English invention. It replaced the formal patterns, clipped hedges and straight lines that were in vogue throughout Europe.

William Kent introduced a new notion in the 1730s: a ‘natural’ garden, full of variety, drama and surprise. Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown, the second major figure in the landscape gardening movement, was multi-talented and widely influential - although attacked by his enemies as ‘the meagre genius of the bare and bald’, and ‘Brown the destroyer’. Brown was followed by the ever-ingenious Humphrey Repton, who introduced elements of flower gardening, and promoted his designs with ‘Red Books’ containing ‘before’ and ‘after’ views of his patrons’ estates. Examples are drawn from gardens such as Rousham, Claremont, Painshill, Kew, Stowe and Stourhead.

Dr Patrick Conner is the Director of Martyn Gregory Gallery in London, and the author of several books. He was previously a teacher at Marlborough College, and Keeper of Fine Art at the Royal Pavillion Art Gallery & Museum, Brighton.

Image: Stowe Gardens Palladian Bridge

In 2003 a project was set up to catalogue the UK’s national collection of oil paintings. It involved visiting 3,000 locations across the UK and photographing 212,000 individual paintings. The lecture offers an insider’s view of this ambitious and unique project.

Mary Rose Rivett-Carnac has a First Class honours degree in History of Art and English Literature, and an MA in Victorian Studies from Royal Hollway College, University of London, and has written several art-related articles. Since 2007 she has worked for the Public Catalogue Foundation (recently re-named Art UK) - an acclaimed arts project that is the focus of today's lecture.

Image: The London Borough of Camden's artistic heritage is brought to life in 'Camden Vol. II', pub. 2013

This lecture will look at the early experiments into porcelain making in England; concentrating on the Chelsea, Bow, Derby and Worcester factories. It will examine the different pastes developed in an attempt to achieve both whiteness and strength, consider the influence of both silver and continental porcelain on shapes and decoration; and will look back at Chinese and Japanese export wares as a source of inspiration. In addition, it will show the ways in which porcelain was both displayed and used and discuss the fashion for porcelain figures.

Jane Gardiner has an MA in History of Art from London University, and lectures widely. She trained at the V&A, where she continues to lecture, and was a senior lecturer at Sotheby's becoming a Deputy Director of Sotheby's UK. 

Image: Bow Porcelain Factory, Lady Falconer, c.1755

Ever since the mid-nineteenth century, modern art has been (and remains) a popular subject for satire. Constantly changing and often seemingly bizarre, modern art made an irresistible target for a host of cartoonists, humorous writers and wise-guys. Some artists, such as Gustave Courbet, welcomed their attention in the belief that there was no such thing as bad publicity; others, like Jackson Pollock, were hurt by what they took to be an attack on their integrity. The cartoonists themselves could be funny, cruel and at times extremely perceptive. From the French humorist, Cham, through the work of the gifted staff on the New Yorker, to the Daily Telegraph’s brilliant cartoonist Matt, they provide an absorbing, illuminating and, above all, a funny, revealing and sidelong view of 150 years of modern art.

Barry Venning is currently an associate lecturer with the Open University and a freelance lecturer. His interests and teaching extend from medieval architecture to contemporary British Art. He is an historian with a particular interest in the work of JMW Turner on whom he has published widely, and was the BBC's script consultant on Turner's Fighting Temeraire. He has also published a study of John Constable's paintings.

Image: Jackson Pollock, The Key

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

Ann Clements has a wide experience of lecturing at home and abroad. She has worked on cataloguing English watercolours and drawings for the Whitworth Art gallery, Manchester, and has done research for Paul Mellon.

Image: Frost Fair on the Thames, 1683

Diamonds have long fascinated us with their beauty - they literally outshine all other gemstones with their unique qualities of reflection and brilliance. This lecture examines these qualities by looking at a diamond's physical attributes, how we have learnt to exploit them with beautiful cuts and shapes and how they have been used in both fashion and investment throughout the ages. Diamonds have traditionally been sourced in India, Brazil, and South Africa; they are now being mined in widespread areas such as Australia, Russia and Canada. They have been worn by Maharajahs, Renaissance Kings and Queens, and actresses on the red carpet. Diamonds are a fascinating and unique stone with a story to match.

Patricia Law is a fellow of the Gemmological Institute, City of London, and has completed the Institute's Diamond Diploma. She also holds a Diploma from the National Association of Goldsmiths and a BA in the History of Art and Architecture from Reading University. She worked for many years in the silver and jewellery department of Phillips Auctioneers. She is now an independent jewellery consultant.

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

Clive Barham Carter studied Egyptology at Cambridge. In addition to 30 years' teaching in secondary education he has also lectured widely, including to the City Literary Institute and the Guildford Institute at the University of Surrey. He is a member of the Egypt Exploration Society, which was co-founded by Amelia Edwards..

The Great Fire of London of 1666, which came only months after the Great Plague, devastated most of the City of London. 13,500 houses, 87 churches and 44 livery halls, as well as many public buildings, were destroyed within four days. This lecture examines the devastation wrought by the fire, looks at the inspirational plans put forward for the rebuilding of the City and explains how the reconstruction that followed changed the face of London for ever.

Barbara Askew is an historian and London Blue Badge guide, and a rota guide for the Albert Memorial, the British Museum and the Houses of Parliament. She is also an acknowledged expert on Windsor Castle

Image:  Ludgate in flames, oil painting by anonymous artist circa 1670

The lecture will be preceded by the Society AGM at 1.30pm

Much information and misinformation have forever linked Freemasonry with the Knights Templar whose headquarters were the Temple Church in London as well as the eccentric Rosslyn Chapel a few miles away from Edinburgh. While there are some genuine connections amongst the three institutions, they do stand on their own.

Pauline Chakmakjian is an independent lecturer on both eighteenth-century British Freemasonry and Freemasonry in contemporary Japan (including masonic symbolism), as well as certain aspects of Japanese culture such as historical periods, the City of Kyoto, and Machiya (traditional Japanese townhouses). Appointed a Visit Kyoto Ambassador by the Mayor of the City of Kyoto. She holds a BA in English Language & Literature (Whittier), a DipLaw (London) and an MA in Modern French Studies (London). She has given public lectures since 2004. Also offers lectures on more unusual subjects and gave a lecture tour for ADFAS/Australia in 2013.

A non-technical and not-too-serious account of this masterpiece, its characters and story, with musical illustrations on the piano, focussing on the composer's ability to express character and mood through music and with a brief look at the circumstances and context of its composition. 

Jonathan Hinden was educated at St Paul's School & Trinity College, Cambridge. Now semi retired, he was a Principal Coach at Glyndebourne Opera (Head of Music Staff until 1997) and worked as keyboard player and conductor for Glyndbourne Touring Opera, Kent Opera and English Touring Opera. He has also taught at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the Royal Academy of Music, the National Opera Studio and the Advanced Performers' Studio

Image: poster for the world premier in Venice March 1853

Begun in 1220 the cathedral at Salisbury, built to replace a smaller building at Old Sarum, was completed in as little as 38 years. It is the most complete Early English cathedral in the country. The tower and spire were added after 1315. Built on the existing foundations, which are only four feet deep, the spire reaches just over 400 feet, the tallest in England. The glory of the building was captured by both Constable and Turner just as it was being unsympathetically restored by James Wyatt - 'The Destroyer'. The building after 1860 was subsequently 'restored' to its medieval glory by George Gilbert Scott. This lecture explores the different phases of the Cathedral's history through the centuries and focuses on the 18th and 19th century restorations and the controversies generated.

Christopher Rogers read Geography at Oxford and taught Geography. He was formerly Head of Geography, Downe House School Newbury. He became interested in country house architecture whilst at Oxford and has lectured on the subject ever since. He gives regular 5-day courses for Marlborough College Summer School. He also lectures for the National Trust.

This lecture will address the art of the Protestant Netherlands in 'The Golden Age' of the 17th Century. It will explore the dramatic story of the revolt against Spain from 1568-1648 and will describe how the wealth of Holland's commercial empire fuelled an interest in new subjects such as landscapes, interiors, still-life and maritime paintings. It will trace the origins of Dutch art to Northern realism and the technical and narrative traditions of Burgundian painters. It will place particular emphasis on the work of Rembrandt whose portraits and Biblical subjects became popular among the new urban middle class.The lecturer will contrast Rembrandt's vigorous manner to the use of light, space and texture in the interiors of Pieter de Hooch, Nicholas Maes and Johannes Vermeer. In the same way he will compare the smooth, idealised landscapes of van Cuyp to Jacob van Ruysdael's broad, vernacular style, and in doing so will show how van Ruysdael's work, like Rembrandt's, anticipates some of the characteristics of later Dutch artists such as van Gogh.

Gerald Deslandes was between 1975 and 1990 the curator of a municipal art gallery in Scotland, director of two Arts Council-subsidised contemporary art galleries in Leeds and Cornwall and exhibitions director at two art centres in Manchester and Cardiff. He organised early-career shows of sculpture by Antony Gormley, Andy Goldsworthy, Susan Hiller, Cornelia Parker, Richard Deacon, Tony Cragg, Richard Wentworth, Bill Woodrow, Alison Wilding and Mona Hatoum. He also organised numerous group shows - including work from South America, Russia, Germany and the USA - and shows of painting, photography, TV, film, architecture and design.

In 1709 in a small riverside town in Shropshire, a Quaker industrialist, Abraham Darby, set up the Coalbrookdale Iron Foundry - and became a pioneer of the Industrial Revolution. With plentiful coal and a new method of smelting iron ore he inaugurated an industrial revolution. The beautiful Iron Bridge across the River Severn was begun by his grandson in 1776, and the technology that created this graceful span went on to be applied to buildings, ships and railroads around the world. In this talk we'll explore some of the many ways in which the work of inventors, industrialists and designers like the Darbys, Josiah Wedgwood, Matthew Boulton, Thomas Telford and the Stephensons are reflected in the art of the nineteenth century. We'll see how new techniques affected design, and consider how mass production and the changing landscape affected life for rich and poor. The apogee of this industrial age was the Chrystal Palace exhibition of 1851. We'll look at the building, its contents and the huge success of the Great Exhibition, as well as its legacy for art, design and architecture throughout the nineteenth century and beyond.

Jo Walton has combined teaching and lecturing with a career in art bookselling and has been a volunteer guide at both Tate Britain and Tate Modern. She is now a freelance lecturer for NADFAS, the Art Fund, and Friends of Dulwich Picture Gallery and local art societies.

Throughout art men have often been shown to be behaving badly, frequently at the expense of women. From Hogarth’s Rake’s Progress through to other rakes portrayed by Reynolds or featured in Pre-Raphaelite and Victorian narrative paintings, the theme has been explored. The talk brings the number of ‘rakes’ in art, both on and off the canvas, up-to-date and into our times, with Picasso, Gauguin, Augustus John, Jacob Epstein, Lucian Freud and others. In the interests of balance, there is a short section at the end entitled ‘Women Strike Back!’.

John Iddon is a Lecturer and Guide at both Tate Britain and Tate Modern. He ran an MA course in Heritage Interpretation at St Mary's University College, and has lectured freelance to numerous art societies, to the National Trust and the Peggy Guggenheim Gallery in Venice. He also lectures on art for cruises. In 2012, he wrote the new guidebook to the newly opened Strawberry Hill.

Members are invited to join the Committee for wine and a light buffet from 1.10pm.  Raffle

Charles Dickens has often been proclaimed as 'the man who invented Christmas' and indeed on hearing that Dickens had died, a Cockney barrow girl said 'Dickens dead? Then will Father Christmas die too?' Dickens revived the Christmas traditions with his warm portrayal of Christmas in the domestic setting. Although he celebrated Christmas in numerous works it is his enduring masterpiece A Christmas Carol published on 19th December 1843 which immortalises the spirit of Christmas Cheer. In this lecture Bertie Pearce reveals a Dickensian Christmas with readings, biographical details and conjuring tricks.

Bertie has a BA (Hons) in Drama from Manchester University, and a Diploma Internationale from the École Internationale du Théatre, Jacques Lecoq. A member of the Inner Magic Circle, with Gold Star. Past experience includes lecturing to cruise ship audiences, the Women’s Institute, theatre clubs and the Sussex Magic Circle, as well as NADFAS. In addition, he has toured the world with a magic cabaret show and a one-man show entitled ‘All Aboard’. He has also written an article on entertainment for the Guardian newspaper.

This covers the two aspects of a painting that the Victorians loved, and expected, its story telling as well as its moral issues. Both of these are seen to the full, not just in the work of traditional Victorian painters such as Fildes, Holl and Frith, but also in the Pre-Raphaelite paintings. We remind ourselves of the fascination the movement, and its participants, held for the Victorians, as well as the scandal it engendered. Millais becomes the main protagonist, as he covers both aspects – the Narrative Painting and the Pre Raphaelites - and develops into one of the most revered of Victorian Painters with his later landscapes and topical portraits. 

Elizabeth Strang attained a humanities degree through the Open University, with art as a main subject, specifically Modern Art. Recruited as a Guide when Tate Modern opened in 2000 and has since worked at both Tate Modern and Tate Britain. Through the Tate, lectured on cruises for 3 years specialising in 20th century art, and now lectures locally on this subject.