The Arts Society Spring 2021

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MAKING A STAND

ARTIST BOB AND ROBERTA SMITH ON WHY ART IS OUR HUMAN RIGHT

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REACHING OUT THE POWER OF TOUCH AND HOW ARTISTS USE IT FIRST VIEW BEHIND THE SCENES AT A SPRING SPECTACLE SHOWSTOPPERS WHY HEPWORTH, PERRIAND AND CALDER WERE 20TH-CENTURY PIONEERS

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THE ARTS SOCIETY MAGAZINE SPRING 2021 / £3.50

Enriching lives through the arts The Arts Society House, 8 Guilford Street, London WC1N 1DA Tel: 020 7430 0730 theartssociety.org magazine@theartssociety.org

ANDREW MONTGOMERY

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THE ARTS SOCIETY

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Patron: Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Gloucester Chair: Julie Goldsmith President: Loyd Grossman CBE Vice Presidents: Martin Drury; Philippa Glanville OBE; Desmond Shawe-Taylor; Alison Richmond Chief Executive: Florian Schweizer

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THE ARTS SOCIETY MAGAZINE Published on behalf of The Arts Society by Think, Capital House, 25 Chapel Street, London NW1 5DH Tel: +44 (0)20 3771 7200 thinkpublishing.co.uk

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Editor: Sue Herdman Group Art Director: Matthew Ball Chief Sub-Editor: Marion Thompson Digital Editor: Holly Black Listings Editor: Annie Davies Group Account Director: Rachel Walder Advertising Sales: Sonal Mistry, Group Advertising Manager, 020 3771 7247, sonal.mistry@thinkpublishing.co.uk Printed by: Walstead Roche The Arts Society Magazine is published three times a year by The Arts Society (formerly NADFAS) and circulated to its membership.

The views expressed in The Arts Society Magazine are not necessarily those of the Chairman, Trustee Board or the Editor. Every effort has been made to check the accuracy of the information in The Arts Society Magazine. However, neither The Arts Society nor NEL Ltd can accept responsibility for inaccuracies or omissions. Articles, photographs, drawings, etc in The Arts Society Magazine may not be reproduced without the written permission of the Chief Executive of The Arts Society. The Society accepts no responsibility for goods and services advertised in The Arts Society Magazine, whether the advertiser is a Member or not. Advertisements are published for convenience of Members, and Members choosing to buy or sell through the medium of this magazine do so entirely at their own risk. © The Arts Society 2021

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On our cover: we photographed artist Bob and Roberta Smith by the sea, near his Ramsgate studio

Let’s Make Art Cosmic, Bob and Roberta Smith

e all know the phrase ‘Groundhog Day’. In the US it refers to 2 February, when it’s said the groundhog wakens after hibernation. If it sees its shadow, there will be six more weeks of winter. If not, spring comes early. Its second meaning, of course, denotes a not necessarily welcome repeated experience – rather like lockdown 3. As we steer these times, what gets us through? Along with the warmth of human connections and Marie Kondo-style clear-outs (again), there is art. It fires the pleasure centres in our brains, creates distracting provocation and provides escape. Within this issue I hope you’ll find all three. Our interview with Bob and Roberta Smith (from page 20), is certainly illuminating. An artist who uses the medium of signwriting to create art with punchy messages, he is one of the most powerful advocates we have for arts education in the UK. We also have the soothing tranquillity of the giant, immersive floral art of Rebecca Louise Law. Or is it so soothing? Don’t be deceived: like all things botanic, it comes with messages that can have a sting. Hold on to that sensation as we also offer something for our touch-deprived times: an exploration of recent research on touch – for which we are all wired – and how artists show it in their work. From wired up to wired art, we look, too, at the timeless work of Alexander Calder, and that of his contemporaries Barbara Hepworth and Charlotte Perriand. This is art, and design, to offer escape – although you could simply set out on foot and follow one of the fantastic Trails of Discovery developed by Arts Society Volunteers. To get involved, see page 40.

Wherever you find your ‘escape’ this spring, we hope that your membership of The Arts Society plays its part.

SUE HERDMAN EDITOR

GET IN TOUCH!

Send us your views at magazine@theartssociety.org Sign up for our monthly arts news and ‘Instant Expert’ at theartssociety.org/signup THEA RTSSOCIET Y.ORG / 03

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Contents, 1

CO N TEN TS THE ARTS SOCIETY MAGAZINE / SPRING 2021

NATURE MORTE, 2018, REBECCA LOUISE LAW. ANDERS SUNE BERG; NIVAAGAARDS MALERISAMLING

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14 33 TRIUMVIRATE OF TALENT

06 5 THINGS TO DO

Inspiring arts ideas for this spring

08 OPINION

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Arts Society Lecturer Dr Caroline Levisse asks what makes a work of art a masterpiece

12 INSTANT EXPERT

Explore the story of a Renaissance work

by Botticelli, just sold for $92m

14 SPRING SPECTACLE

Discover what artist Rebecca Louise Law is creating with 250,000 flowers this season

20 INSIDE BOB AND ROBERTA’S WORLD Why the artist Bob and Roberta Smith is calling for us all to ‘Make Your Own Damn Art’

26 A SENSE OF TOUCH

In our touch-starved times, we investigate how artists are drawn to the power it represents

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Charlotte Perriand, Alexander Calder and Barbara Hepworth – what makes their work timeless?

40 TRAILBLAZERS

How Arts Society Trails of Discovery are connecting people with their local heritage

44 WHAT’S ON

Plan ahead for the best in the arts

48 STUDY DAYS

Discover a new area of the arts on one of our in-depth days

52 SOCIETIES NEWS

Your news and a message from our Patron, Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Gloucester

56 SPECIAL OFFERS

Our curated offers for you

57 BOOKS

New arts and culture reads to enjoy

58 THE ART THAT MADE ME

Artist Dr Chila Kumari Singh Burman on the art forms that influence her

CONTRIBUTORS

DR CAROLINE LEVISSE Caroline is an arts historian and an Arts Society Lecturer, whose speciality is modern European art. Among her lectures is a survey of the elements that make a masterpiece: but is it time, she asks inside, to adapt our definition of that term?

DR CHILA KUMARI SINGH BURMAN Born in Liverpool and of Punjabi heritage, Chila is a multimedia artist celebrated for her radical feminist practice. Her Tate Britain Winter Commission lit up the gallery’s facade last winter in a flare of colour and neon lights DR AMY ORROCK Amy is senior curator at Compton Verney Art Gallery & Park and an Arts Society Lecturer. Inside she gives us a preview of the gallery’s huge, new floral art installation by artist Rebecca Louise Law. A tonic for spring, it also carries powerful messages

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SUSANNE DIETZ

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BARBARA HEPWORTH, FIGURE (ARCHAEAN), 1959 © BOWNESS, HEPWORTH ESTATE, PHOTO: JONTY WILDE

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THE KISS, 1907–08, GUSTAV KLIMT. BRIDGEMAN IMAGES

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From the Brontës in Brussels to mass migration and the arts in Britain; from Vincent van Gogh to Cleopatra’s image (this is how John William Waterhouse imagined her in 1887), the art talks on offer from our Arts Society Lecturers are as far-ranging as ever. In current times, many of our Societies offer a rich selection to enjoy online. Check with your Society to see what is planned for this spring. There’s also a choice of online Area organised events: see pages 48 and 49 and tap into theartssociety.org/study-daysand-courses

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From Hockney’s spring to an arty podcast, here is a taster of this season’s highlights

2 NO. 241, 23 APRIL 2020; © DAVID HOCKNEY

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SEE SPRING ARRIVE Last spring David Hockney had a period of intense artistic activity at his home in Normandy. The resulting works, revealing the season as it arrived around him, go on show at the Royal Academy in David Hockney: The Arrival of Spring, Normandy, 2020.

Each was ‘painted’ on Hockney’s iPad, then printed on paper at far larger size, the artist overseeing production. From views of his ancient house to misty April showers, blossom to daffodils, this will be an exhibition to transport us from winter, to the hope of a time of new growth.

27 March–22 August royalacademy.org.uk

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LAKELAND ARTS

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When government advice allows, two tranquil Lake District sites to visit are Brantwood, home of the Victorian writer, arts and social reformer John Ruskin, and Blackwell, the Arts and Crafts house on Windermere. The latter plans to stage The House of the Setting Sun this spring (26 March– 10 October) – a show exploring the legacy of artistic exchange between Japan and Britain. Expect Japanese woodblock prints, exquisite ceramics and a never before displayed Edo period kimono. We like the sound, too, of a trip aboard the 1902 steam launch Osprey (pictured), which can be booked for exclusive hire for up to six people – perfect for a social bubble. lakelandarts.org.uk

ON A 5 POP PODCAST There’s a podcast for every taste – but one of our current favourites on the arts is Talk Art with actor (and art collector) Russell Tovey and gallerist Robert Diament. It features exclusive and refreshingly informal interviews with leading artists, curators and gallerists. Images of the artworks discussed in each episode feature on Instagram @TalkArt. The first podcast of 2021 was with the artist who covered Tate Britain in neon lights last winter, and who we interview on page 58 – Dr Chila Kumari Singh Burman. Listen to Talk Art at play.acast.com

The V&A’s Bags: Inside Out is an exploration of the ultimate accessory. Status symbol, political statement or even work of art – if you’d like to know why the humble bag has become such a focus for some of our most creative minds, take the chance to see the 300 examples on display. Among them are Tracey Emin’s 2004 International Woman suitcase for Longchamp (left), and this sleek Moynat Mini Pyramide Gravity Bag, 2019 (right).

Until 12 September vam.ac.uk

© VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM

4 BAG A TICKET

See our in-depth listings from page 44 For our top arts events each month, sign up to theartssociety.org/signup Please check for latest information on openings THEA RTSSOCIET Y.ORG / 07

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Opinion, 1

OPINION Vincent van Gogh’s Green Wheat, 1889

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WHO SAYS IT’S A MASTERPIECE?

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How do we recognise an outstanding work of art – and who are the ‘we’?

Arts Society Lecturer Dr Caroline Levisse reveals her theories

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When the word ‘chef-d’œuvre’ – (‘masterpiece’) – first appeared in French medieval documents, it referred to the work created by a craftsman to mark the end of his apprenticeship. This was a form of examination, during which the apprentice would demonstrate his skills, his savoir-faire.

Success was determined by the ability to execute a piece to perfection, dans les règles de l’art (or ‘by the book’). During the Renaissance, painting and sculpture were newly considered as ‘art’ rather than a trade or craft, and art academies replaced guilds as an authoritative and organising body. From then, creativity became increasingly important in the making of an outstanding work of art. In his Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects (1550), Giorgio Vasari celebrated artists’ technical virtuosity and their unique vision and inventiveness. Michelangelo’s David and Leonardo’s Mona Lisa are two excellent examples.

It is in the 19th century that the concept of ’masterpiece’ becomes truly important for the history of art. While public art museums were still a relative novelty (the

Louvre opened in 1793, the National Gallery in 1824), and art history was a burgeoning academic discipline, experts wrote the story of art as a succession of great moments, or steps, towards the present. This story of artistic evolution was neatly packaged in the so-called canon of art.

From Van Eyck’s Adoration of the Mystic Lamb to Giotto’s Scrovegni Chapel, the canon tells us which are the best works to have been created. It represents an ideal of perfection for aspiring artists to emulate (or defy), and art lovers to admire and collect. As this cultural norm became part of our basic art education, it shaped our taste and expectations.

How do art historians choose which works are the greatest? They have a range of criteria, such as the exceptional quality of execution, showing a mastery of the medium; the efficient communication of a meaningful story, idea or emotion; the originality and inventiveness of the work; its complexity; and its historical significance.

But perhaps the most distinctive trait of a masterpiece is its ability to endure, despite changes in society. In a 1979 essay, ’What is a Masterpiece?’, art historian and broadcaster Kenneth Clark mentioned the ‘extraordinary fact that they can speak to us, as they have spoken to our ancestors for centuries’. In other words, the concept of the masterpiece refers to a special class of art; works that are so great they transcend historical boundaries and have a universal value. The profound humanity we encounter in some of Rembrandt’s portraits

‘IT IS TEMPTING TO ABANDON THE IDEA OF THE MASTERPIECE AS AN OBSOLETE CONCEPT’

still has the power to move us, making these works masterpieces of portraiture.

However attractive, this universal claim became problematic. For decades, art history has been facing its biases, demonstrating that its central narrative reflects the values of a specific group – an elite. In her 1971 essay ’Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?’, Linda Nochlin explained how the criteria for greatness are ‘rigged’ in favour of a particular group, excluding others. This also affects viewers. For the many not of the elite, the masterpieces forming the canon of art may feel at odds with their lived experience and collective history.

It is tempting to abandon the idea of the masterpiece as an obsolete concept tailored for a bygone world, and adopt a more relativistic approach. But if we are to hold on to the conviction that some creations are more extraordinary than others, worth preserving and sharing with as many as possible, we need to adapt the definition of the masterpiece and make room for a wider range of experiences.

OUR EXPERT’S STORY

Dr Caroline Levisse Arts Society Accredited Lecturer

• Caroline is an art historian who specialises in modern European art, with a focus on Scandinavia • One of the courses she teaches is ‘What makes a masterpiece?’, which has led her to study this essential topic • Among her talks for The Arts Society are The colour blue in Western art, Danish Modernism: the Skagen painters and Caspar David Friedrich: the Romantic landscape

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OUR EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEWS AND FEATURES DRAWN FROM ACROSS THE ARTS WORLD REPRO OP

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Fred Baier describes himself as a furniture artist.

He works across design, fine art and craft, creating beautifully made, highly inventive pieces – seen here are his Pyramid Chairs.

The New Art Centre in Wiltshire is showing his work in Fred Baier: form swallows function, on until 10 April 2021. As we go to press, if government restrictions are still in place, Roche Court Sculpture Park, at the centre – a lovely spot to visit and enjoy art – remains open for local visitors. Timed bookings need to be made. The indoor galleries are also designed so that work exhibited within can be enjoyed from the outside.

— sculpture.uk.com

ART PRODUCTION PYRAMID CHAIRS X 2, 2014 (DESIGNED 1978/9), FRED BAIER

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SPOTLIGHT ON THE ARTS

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Two artworks in one: Botticelli’s painting features work by another artist

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Setting the scene.

Born in Florence c.1445, Sandro Botticelli was apprenticed to Fra Filippo Lippi and, at the peak of his career, achieved astonishing success. No other painter, says Christopher Apostle, head of Sotheby’s Old Master paintings in New York, ‘evokes the golden age of the Florentine Renaissance more powerfully than Sandro Botticelli’.

He was the creator of two of the most famous works in European art, Primavera (c.1482) and The Birth of Venus (c.1485).

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This is an enigmatic work.

Botticelli was one of the first artists to steer away from showing sitters in profile.

This young man fixes the viewer with a direct gaze. Botticelli was a gifted draughtsman, skilled at expressive hand gestures; note the figure’s elegant hand holding the roundel, a finger resting on the sill, appearing to extend out of the painting.

That roundel, says Sotheby’s, is especially interesting. ‘It is an original 14th-century work attributed to the Sienese painter Bartolommeo Bulgarini, which was inserted into the panel on which Botticelli painted his portrait. The significance of this visual device remains to be decoded, but must relate in some way to the identity of the handsome young nobleman.’

No one is sure who he is. His fine clothes denote social standing; and his hairstyle is of the height of Renaissance fashion: could he have been a Medici?

Botticelli’s portraits are relatively rare.

‘It was in early Renaissance Italy,’ says Sotheby’s, ‘that portraits of notable individuals came to be considered high art.’

Decades before Leonardo painted Mona Lisa, Botticelli was creating portraits of the highest calibre. Yet only a dozen are known to survive.

Three of those are in private hands, the rest in museums.

This work was in a private collection for over a century, and occasionally loaned to museums.

It was first recorded in the 1930s in the collection of Lord Newborough at Caernarfon, Wales, and is believed to have been acquired by the first Lord Newborough (1736–1807) when living in Tuscany.

The painting is 551 years old… …yet the young man looks, comments George Wachter, Sotheby’s co-chairman of Old Master paintings worldwide, ‘like he could have strolled into our galleries this morning’.

He possesses a beauty that Botticelli strived to perfect in his finished composition: X-rays and infrared reflectograms reveal extensive underdrawings, showing how the artist was subtly developing the pose and details as he worked on his canvas.

What makes this work so valuable?

Its exquisite condition, singularity and rarity. The pared-down composition and the fact that it holds critical elements for a fine painting of this era set it apart.

‘When we think of the illusionism of the

SOTHEBY’S

This is Sandro Botticelli’s Young Man Holding a Roundel, just sold at Sotheby’s New York for $92m. Why did it command such a figure? Sue Herdman examines its story

High Renaissance – complex architectural forms, geographic linearity and two-point perspective, along with vibrant colours – all of those elements are present in this work,’ says Apostle.

Until now, the auction record for Botticelli’s work was set in 2013.

His so-called ‘Rockefeller Madonna’ (or Madonna and Child with Young Saint John the Baptist) sold for $10.4m.

This is one of the most expensive portraits to have appeared at auction.

Works that have realised close to the figure achieved include Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer II, sold in 2006 for $87.9m, and Van Gogh’s Portrait of Dr Gachet, sold in 1990 for $82.5m.

Explore an art story twice a month with our ‘Instant Expert’ email, from an Arts Society Lecturer. Sign up at theartssociety.org/signup

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PREVIEW VERSION

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Some 250,000 preserved and fresh flowers and foliage are set to fill a gallery at Compton Verney Art Gallery this spring, in an extraordinary new installation by artist Rebecca Louise Law. Arts Society Lecturer and gallery curator Dr Amy Orrock takes us behind the scenes

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s this magazine went to press, there was activity at Compton Verney. With masses of flowers suspended from the ceiling on thousands of copper wires, an ambitious installation called Seasons has been going up; its subtitle is ‘a journey through nature’. Winding around and filling one of the gallery spaces, it is set to take viewers on an experiential voyage through the year: opening with spring, before looping almost full circle through summer, autumn and winter.

With the final part of the installation formed from flora foraged from the gallery’s own grounds, Seasons provides a tangible link with the natural world bursting into life beyond the gallery walls.

Accompanying the installation will be a selection of Law’s preparatory material, including the poignant nature diaries kept by the artist throughout 2020. So new is this installation that our images can only show work to date by the artist. Turn overleaf to discover more about her approach and the powerful messages that lie behind this, her latest work. »

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‘LAW’S INSTALLATIONS COMBINE AN EPIC SENSE OF SCALE WITH A HARMONIOUS SENSE OF PLACE’

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for a florist. By 2003 she was using flowers as paint and space as canvas.

Symbolic of the brevity of life, flowers have been depicted by artists since ancient times. Yet their use as sculptural material is relatively rare, their ephemeral nature deemed to make them unsuitable for permanent artworks.

Law’s response to assumptions about the ‘fleeting’ nature of floral beauty is scientific and impassioned. Working with preserved and fresh flowers, she highlights precedents of flowers preserved for more than 100 years in Victorian still-life vitrines, and surviving floral artefacts stored by the Egyptians in 1700 BC. Law also embraces decay in her work, stating: ‘It’s difficult to flow against the cycle of life and death, trying to preserve and hold on to a material that traditionally has little or no value in modern culture… I have always longed to create an art that enables human kind to have serenity with nature, transporting them into a space without the constraints of time and where there is still life in death.’

Law’s installations combine an epic sense of scale with a harmonious sense of place.

The Canopy (2016) is a permanent work inside a Melbourne mall, with 150,000 blooms from Australia’s Yarra region suspended over shoppers’ heads. For Banquet (2019) at La Roche-Jagu, a medieval French banqueting hall was filled with 15,000 flowers to evoke the sensory pleasures of a feast, using Normandy flowers close to medieval species.

THE ARTIST AND HER MEDIUM

Law’s choice of medium is no accident. She can trace six generations of gardeners in her family.

Growing up close to a National Trust estate, she describes a childhood filled with nature, learning about horticulture from her father, who was head gardener at Anglesey Abbey.

Above: Rebecca She believes that flowers are the ultimate Louise Law; all gift of the natural world. ‘Playing’ and a her works focus wonder in nature are core to her practice. on nature While studying Fine Art she became frustrated by her inability to accurately represent the sublime qualities of nature on canvas. Inspired by installation art, she swapped paint for flowers, acquiring knowledge of her medium by working 1 6 / T H E A RTSS OC IETY.O RG

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Compton Verney, 2 TOLEDO MUSEUM OF ART

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Left: Nature Morte, 2018 Right: Community, 2018

CHARLES EMERSON; SHIRLEY SHERWOOD GALLERY

Below: Life in Death, 2017

A DIARY AND A VISION

Seasons was commissioned before the onset of the pandemic, but recent events have made the project more resonant. Lockdowns grounded Law at her home in Snowdonia, giving her ‘the gift of time’.

Inspired by painter Mary Newcomb, whose work is also on show at the gallery, Law decided to keep a 2020 nature diary, writing, drawing and preserving aspects of the natural world in notebooks. She has also kept a daily Instagram diary (@rebeccalouiselawdiary), capturing moments as the months change. Begun in November 2019, these diaries span a period during which people found solace in nature on their doorsteps: micro and macroworlds intertwined.

Running alongside Law’s diary insights is a vision of nature that is as expansive and inclusive as her art. Core to her practice is community involvement. ‘I make installations to enable people to interact with nature, to give time to observe and be moved by the beauty of creation,’ she states. Volunteers are regularly drafted in to help facilitate her work at the final stages. Her largest installation to date, Community (Toledo Museum of Art, 2019), contained 520,000 elements, each individually wired into garlands with the help of 1,000 volunteer hours. Law’s commitment to collaborative making as a means of facilitating engagements with nature is part of what makes working with her so exciting. » THEA RTSSOCIET Y.ORG / 1 7

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SEE Rebecca Louise Law: Seasons, 2 April– 30 August Mary Newcomb: Nature’s Canvas, 2 April–18 July, Compton Verney Art Gallery & Park, Warwickshire; comptonverney.org.uk

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To participate in the public nature diary, share your clips of the natural world using the hashtag: #cvnaturediary Please check for latest on openings before visiting

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This hands-on experience is just one element in a broader programme of engagement that responds to the decline of ‘nature connectedness’ in society.

Law’s approach is a tonic for our beleaguered times. A meaningful relationship between nature and people is known to be essential both to individual wellbeing and to tackling wildlife Above: The Beauty preservation and collective causes of climate crisis. Recent research reveals that of Decay, 2016 levels of nature connectedness dip sharply in children aged 10-15, a sobering fact that leads to Compton Verney’s focus on secondary school communities. The children are involved on-site and in their classrooms (in times of no government restrictions due to the pandemic) and at home, and are encouraged to keep their own nature diaries and to contribute to the wider public call-out for Instagram nature diary clips.

Law’s sustainable approach to the natural world is inspiring. The mass cultivation and transportation of flowers for the floristry industry costs over £100bn per annum, with no expectation that the temporary displays will last beyond the average two-week life expectancy of a cut flower. In contrast to this disposable culture, Law’s flowers are carefully hung upside down to air-dry. Much of her preserved material is retained for future projects. Some of the flowers

used in Seasons come from her collection and date back to 2004; these are supplemented by a layer of foliage and flowers harvested from Law’s garden over the past year. In line with this ethos, the exhibition graphics are fully recyclable.

Capturing and preserving the sights, sounds and smells of nature, this installation will leave no physical trace, but the experience of engaging with Seasons will endure.

OUR EXPERT’S STORY

Dr Amy Orrock Arts Society Accredited Lecturer

• Amy is senior curator at Compton Verney Art Gallery & Park • An art historian and curator, she has published and lectured widely on northern European art of the 16th and 17th centuries • Among the exhibitions she has curated are Cranach: Artist and Innovator (2020–21) and Painting Childhood: From Holbein to Freud (2019). Her lectures include Who was Bruegel? Discovering the Master through his Sons and Centuries of Childhood: Portraits of Children from Holbein to Freud

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THE ARTS SOCIETY INTERVIEW VERSION

The artist in his Ramsgate studio REPRO OP SUBS ART PRODUCTION CLIENT

Inside Bob and Roberta’s world Art empowers children, but we must transform the way we teach it, says artist and activist Bob and Roberta Smith.

He believes every human being is an artist, even if they have to steal to be one.

Sue Herdman meets him to find out why PHOTOGRAPHY: JOHN MILLAR

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Art is in All of Us and Draw Hope, 2020

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ob and Roberta Smith shares a story in his latest book, You Are An Artist, which is telling.

He describes how, when small, his mother taught him to draw by sketching a Christmas pudding. ‘Draw the custard first,’ she said, ‘then underneath, draw in the pudding.’ On it progresses, mother gently nudging child to add to his artwork a plate, holly atop the pudding, and friends. ‘Let’s invite everyone to the party,’ she tells her son. ‘Art is an invitation.’ He has been drawing on that statement ever since.

Smith (real name Patrick Brill) is an artist, activist, author, broadcaster, educator, musician and skip diver. He famously favours text as medium, in the form of sign painting, doing so mischievously, passionately, sometimes reassuringly. The Royal Academy’s 2020 Summer Exhibition featured one such work by this Royal Academician, which offered balm in our nervy Covid times. A reworking of one of his mantras, it stated: There Is Still Art, There Is Still Hope. Not all of Smith’s slogans – painted on doors and boards discarded by others – are

Feel the Image and Feel the Colour, 2020

gentle. Most are politically charged.

Among his best known are his 1997 Make Art Not War and his 2011 Letter to Michael Gove. In the latter he charged the then Secretary of State for Education with the ‘destruction of Britain’s ability to draw, design and sing’. In addition to his agitprop ‘letter’, Smith took things further. He stood in the 2015 General Election against Gove, earning space on the public stage to get ‘access to arts’ into the election conversation. The whole exercise, he muses now, ‘was really a large artwork’.

Smith is passionate about arts education. He wants us to champion its power; to understand the way visuality can play a role in early speech and to see how exciting results come from asking the simple question: ‘How about this?’ ‘It’s what artists and designers are saying every time they pick up a paintbrush or pencil,’ he states. When we meet, he’s on sunny but thoughtful form, coming via Zoom from his colourful east London kitchen. ‘It’s important that artists speak about issues like this,’ he states. ‘In terms of its aims, the coalition government’s

EBacc wasn’t a bad thing, but its impact on how the curriculum was organised and how schools get ranked was a disaster for the arts. It’s easy for artists of standing to become a little ivory-towerish, and not get involved in politics. But it’s useful, when you’ve got some authority, to make a stand about things you know about.’

And Smith knows about arts education.

A START IN ART

The genesis for this lies in his early experiences. Born in 1963, his childhood home was centred on art. Even his school had an arty slant: Brandlehow Primary in Putney, now Grade II listed, was designed by that great modernist Ernö Goldfinger, in optimistic post-war London. Smith’s father, the landscape painter Frederick Brill, was head of the Chelsea School of Art. His mother, Deirdre Borlase, was an artist who exhibited at the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition. ‘Both came from working-class backgrounds and I don’t know how they discovered they could draw. But that skill propelled them to 1930s art schools and transformed their lives. There was no

‘DON’T TELL THE STUDENT TO LOOK AT DUCHAMP; ASK INSTEAD WHAT IT IS THEY WANT TO DO. ASK THEM HOW THEY ARE GOING TO THROW PEBBLES INTO THE POOL OF CULTURE THAT WILL CAUSE RIPPLES’ 2 2 / T H E A RTSS OC IETY.O RG

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Interview, 2 Above: All Schools Should Be Art Schools; below: Art Makes Children Powerful

at Duchamp,’ he states over our virtual coffee, ‘ask instead what it is they want to do. Ask them how they are going to throw pebbles into the pool of culture that will cause ripples.

There has to be a transformation in the way we teach art. It needs to be built on ideas of self-expression – that’s the way it is done in the best art education.

Make more. Encourage students to manifest the things they feel are important.’ Smith is all about inclusivity.

He extols the power of ‘creating art that has a workshop element to it, having an educational element in a gallery, where people can make art and engage’. His © BOB AND ROBERTA SMITH

sense in our house that you couldn’t earn a living making art.’ An early memory is of being taken to an exhibition by his mother when aged around six. ‘There, in the foyer, the process of printmaking was happening. I was fascinated. The business of the making of art has stayed with me since that moment.’

A patron of The Big Draw and the National Society for Education in Art and Design, Smith has not only made art all his life, but for over 30 years has taught it too. Currently associate professor at London Metropolitan University, he is an ardent believer in student-centred education. ‘Don’t tell the student to look

chosen pseudonym is spurred by this.

Originally conceived as ‘Bob Smith’ – a random name applied to his early text works – ‘Roberta’ was added when working alongside his sister Roberta; he then kept the name when going solo. His theory is that anyone can be a Bob and Roberta Smith. ‘In fact, for a while, in the 1980s, two couples, one in Japan and one in Germany, called themselves just that and used to send me their art.’ Everyone, as he will never tire of saying, is an artist.

The only problem with this is that along the way we forget that. Smith wants to put that to rights. You Are an Artist is both a revealing exploration of art practice, and a collection of over 40 practical exercises, or ‘creative provocations’, to encourage rediscovery of our latent gifts. Under his gently anarchic, always humorous guidance, you will come to view the » THEA RTSSOCIET Y.ORG / 2 3

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humble plastic milk bottle as a beautiful object. I, for one, hadn’t thought of pasta as Italian folk art before.

Nor considered the possibilities of making a coffin for an imaginary pet, indulging in some creative ironing or, yes, stealing. Does this refer to his skip surveys for boards to paint? ‘I am not asking you to consider a major theft here,’ states the artist. The exercise of ‘stealing’ is, he explains in the book, ‘more about thinking when learning. When we learn, we are in some sense mastering and replicating others’ works and ideas.’ So it’s less about larceny, more about ‘stealing’, or reflecting on, the ideas of others. Smith likes the concept of artists as scavengers ‘because they operate on the outside of society, picking up what is useful for their practice to get by’.

INSIDER, OUTSIDER

Smith has a sense of the outsider about him. With a firm foothold in the established art elite (an OBE for services to art, a former trustee at Tate), his practice also has a freedom, an ability to ‘poke’ with his slogans. He stands up and out on uncomfortable truths, but always

with the end goal of inclusivity. His practice embraces film, radio, documentary, writing and music. His bands include The Ken Ardley Playboys (say it quickly) and The Apathy Band (lead singer, Smith’s wife, the artist Jessica Voorsanger), an arts advocacy and experimental spoken word group that usually can’t be bothered to rehearse.

Smith’s weekly Resonance FM programme broadcasts each Tuesday night. The station is a non-profit community set-up, specialising in the arts; the show is a quirky listening experience, somehow managing to be both cosy and lawless. He cites it as one of the things that got him through the rigours of 2020.

Another is his (huge) latest project, a collaborative commission from Tate and the Peabody Trust called the Thamesmead Codex. This involved interviewing people from the troubled 1960s London Thamesmead (backdrop to, among others, Kubrick’s dystopian A Clockwork Orange).

The broader context had been to talk about Modernism, but naturally Covid elbowed in. Those conversations – many particularly powerful – have been transcribed onto panels to create an © 2020 BOB AND ROBERTA SMITH

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Below: Bob and Roberta Smith’s How About This? 2020

artwork 24 metres square. It features in part a return to some figurative painting and goes on show at Thamesmead this spring, with plans for a showing at Tate Modern later this year.

Listening to his interviewees has been illuminating. Smith is a considered listener. He’s concerned about the effect of the pandemic’s severance of access to art on estates such as this, and in the wider world. ‘Think of all those kids who haven’t seen an amazing piece of new theatre; who haven’t been excited to lift a guitar for the first time; who haven’t been to an exhibition that spurs them to think: “I can do this.” That’s a huge loss. When we have access to the arts – when you are teaching art – you’re enabling something fundamental; you are helping people realise who and what they are. Teaching art is akin to a human right; art teachers are human rights workers. Art enables us to advocate for ourselves, using whatever medium works for us. It helps us process things, letting us sink into our imaginations. It’s about looking and listening to the world and asking: “Is that right?” Artists are truth seekers. The less art you have, the fewer truth seekers.’

Perhaps this is why another of Smith’s mantras and artworks, Make Your Own Damn Art, has its own kind of power right now. It may sound like a fist-pumping shout, but the ethos behind it is charged with hope. Truly, go out and make art. ‘It makes the world,’ says Smith, ‘a better place.’

SEE For news on the showing of Thamesmead Codex, see thamesmeadnow.org.uk

FOR MORE ON Bob and Roberta Smith’s practice, see bobandrobertasmith.co.uk

READ You Are an Artist is published

by Thames & Hudson; thamesandhudson.com

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Caravaggio painted The Incredulity of St Thomas Claudia Hammond Gabrielle d’ Estrées and Her Sister, the Duchess of Villars Gustav Klimt in The Kiss.

Zanele Muholi’s photographs of black LGBT+ South Africans Egon Schiele’s feverish lovers Artemisia Gentileschi’s murder scenes, Professor Michael Banissy, in collaboration with Dr Natalie Mary Cassatt’s Impressionist paintings of mothers and infants Henry Moore’s works Edmund de Waal Bowling 20 Stories High: ‘Black, Scouse and Proud’ David Cahill Roots Revoluton Arts and actor and playwright Sudha Bhuchar

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t’s a painting that, once seen, is never forgotten: Saint Thomas, the doubting apostle, fingering a wound in the risen Christ’s flesh. Its impact is physical – a human reflex of mingled fascination and disgust, which can be felt as viscerally now as in 1602, when Caravaggio painted The Incredulity of St Thomas. It’s a response that is empathetic – how would it feel to poke your fingers deep into another’s flesh? – and one that is, in its bodily nature, capable of transcending the cultural differences of the centuries.

Artists have long been ‘Noli me tangere’: touch me not. According drawntoto the drama, the Bible, these were the words spoken

by Jesusand tenderness sensuality to Mary Magdalene when she recognised him that touch represents. In after his resurrection. It’s a phrase with a grim times when physical contact resonance in our recent touch-starved times, as has been curtailed, our everything from a handshake to the kiss of a lover awareness of all it brings is has been curtailed by the coronavirus: noli me heightened.

Isabella Smith tangere, indeed. ‘I’m fascinated by the reaction explores recent research many of us have now as we recoil when watching intoeach its power and how people on TV in crowded bars or hugging artists use it in their work other,’ says BBC broadcaster and psychology

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The Incredulity of St Thomas; painted in 1602–03 by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, master of realistic detail and depth of feeling

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t’s a painting that, once seen, is never forgotten: Saint Thomas, the doubting apostle, fingering a wound in the risen Christ’s flesh. Its impact is physical – a human reflex of mingled fascination and disgust, which can be felt as viscerally now as in 1602, when Caravaggio painted The Incredulity of St Thomas. It’s a response that is empathetic – how would it feel to poke your fingers deep into another’s flesh? – and one that is, in its bodily nature, capable of transcending the cultural differences of the centuries. ‘Noli me tangere’: touch me not. According to the Bible, these were the words spoken by Jesus to Mary Magdalene when she recognised him after his resurrection.

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handshake to the kiss of a lover has been curtailed by the coronavirus: noli me tangere, indeed. ‘I’m fascinated by the reaction many of us have now as we recoil when watching people on TV in crowded bars or hugging each other,’ says BBC broadcaster and psychology lecturer Claudia Hammond. Last October she revealed the results of The Touch Test: the largest study yet conducted on attitudes towards touch worldwide. ‘This reaction might appear to occur because we are no longer accustomed to it. But I think it’s more a sign that our disgust mechanism has come into play.’

With a coronavirus vaccine here, hopefully we won’t be warding off physical contact for too much longer. But for now, in a world of tiers and social bubbles, seeing touch taking place carries an extra frisson. It’s clear that images of touch can provoke as many different reactions as there are types of touch. Think of the curious – and sensual – pinch featured in Gabrielle d’ Estrées and Her Sister, the Duchess of Villars. What lies behind the candid gesture featured? Or the passionate embrace committed to canvas by Gustav Klimt in The Kiss.

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Above left: Gabrielle d’Estrées and Her Sister, the Duchess of Villars, painted, anonymously, c.1594. The meaning of the oddly affectionate gesture shown is unsure.

It may have been an allusion to d’Estrées’ pregnancy and the birth, in the same year, of the illegitimate son of Henry IV Above right: The Long Engagement, 1859,

by Pre-Raphaelite Arthur Hughes, is rich in tactile detail, from the clasped hands to the glossy hair and soft fabrics. The length of the engagement is revealed by the ivy long grown over the girl’s carved name on the tree

lovers to the violence of Artemisia Gentileschi’s murder scenes, the multifaceted world of touch in art can provoke anything from revulsion to tenderness, curiosity to longing.

CRAVING CONTACT

Physical contact in its near infinite variety was the focus for the scientists behind The Touch Test.

The Wellcome Collection and BBC Radio 4’s All in the Mind teamed up for the global study, which gleaned responses from almost 40,000 people across 112 countries. Taking place largely before our world was changed by the virus, it ran from 21 January to 30 March 2019 (days after the UK’s lockdown began). The public participated via an online questionnaire, developed by academics from the department of psychology at Goldsmiths led by Professor Michael Banissy, in collaboration with Dr Natalie Bowling from the University of Greenwich. The results included 72% of respondents reporting a positive attitude to touch, with the three most common words used to describe it being ‘comforting’, ‘warm’ and ‘love’.

Despite largely being conducted pre-pandemic, it reports that a staggering 43% of adults felt that society does not allow us to touch enough.

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‘Unsurprisingly, if you look at studies done since then, this percentage has risen,’ says Dr Bowling.

‘People experiencing “touch hunger” are attempting touch substitutes, like wrapping themselves in cosy blankets or having hot baths: tactile sensations, but without another person.

Sadly, these mitigation techniques don’t do the job as well (and they don’t help with loneliness).’

The survey didn’t cover whether images of touch might help matters. Yet if our response to characters touching on TV is as visceral as Hammond believes, why would we not be affected by other depictions of touch, such as those that can kindle a certain imaginative warmth? Who could witness the gentle nurturing in Mary Cassatt’s Impressionist paintings of mothers and infants, say, without responding?

It’s not only interpersonal touch that has long preoccupied artists. According to The Touch Test, the materials people most enjoy feeling are fur, velvet and silk. These tactile textures provide much

Above left: Pain and power: note Judith’s grim grasp on the hair of the severed head in this, Cristofano Allori’s Judith with the Head of Holofernes of 1613, on show now at The Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace Above right: Gustav Klimt’s The Kiss, painted in 1907–08, is all about sensual love and tactility, the couple lost in focused embrace

of the visual pleasure in the Pre-Raphaelites’ luxuriant canvases, for instance – all shining hair and gleaming garments – or the flaunting of wealth seen in the elaborate dress of the Old Masters.

ARTIST RESPONSES

Bringing our urge towards the tactile to the present, among artists responding to current experiences has been Edmund de Waal. He recently exhibited pieces made in lockdown, the first such works in 16 years that were not to be part of installations.

Instead they were designed to be touched and held; they are pieces that speak of the need for touch.

‘I was alone in my studio and silent and I needed to make vessels to touch and hold, to pass on… When you pick them up you will find the places where I have marked and moved the soft clay,’ the artist said. This spring he curates an exhibition based on the role of touch in Henry Moore’s works. The Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge is also staging »

‘THE MATERIALS PEOPLE MOST ENJOY FEELING ARE FUR, VELVET AND SILK. THESE TACTILE TEXTURES PROVIDE MUCH OF THE VISUAL PLEASURE IN THE PRE-RAPHAELITES’ LUXURIANT CANVASES’ THEA RTSSOCIET Y.ORG / 2 9

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henry-moore.org

• Masterpieces from Buckingham Palace; The Queen’s Gallery, London; until 31 January 2022; rct.uk FIND OUT MORE

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• The Wellcome Collection and The Touch Test; wellcomecollection.org • Touchstone Tales; bhucharboulevard.com/ touchstone-tales

Please check with all sites before visiting

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• Zanele Muholi; Tate Modern, London; until 31 May 2021; tate.org.uk • The Human Touch: Making Art, Leaving Traces; The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge; until 3 May 2021; fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk • This Living Hand: Edmund de Waal presents Henry Moore; Henry Moore Studios and Gardens, Hertfordshire; 31 March–31 October 2021;

‘THE MULTIFACETED WORLD OF TOUCH IN ART CAN PROVOKE ANYTHING FROM REVULSION TO TENDERNESS, CURIOSITY TO LONGING’ an exhibition that will focus on touch in art through works spanning 4,000 years. And the Wellcome Collection has commissioned two new artworks, both taking The Touch Test as their starting point.

Youth theatre group 20 Stories High, which describes itself as ‘Black, Scouse and Proud’, is currently working on Touchy: a digital performance piece blending hip-hop, poetry and storytelling, due to debut online in February. ‘They want to explore physical touch in its broadest sense – both the emotional and the scientific sides of it,’ says the Wellcome Trust’s arts manager, David Cahill Roots.

‘They’re thinking about touch in relation to power.’

Meanwhile, Revoluton Arts and actor and playwright Sudha Bhuchar have created Touchstone Tales: fictionalised monologues and a

duologue based on real, moving stories of touch, turned into a podcast series and a text published

by Methuen. ‘Most of the people featured are Muslim, people of faith,’ says Bhuchar, speaking of the local community groups she worked with in Luton. ‘We explored topics such as how, with so many deaths during Covid, people were not necessarily able to do the ritual bathing, which is so important – it’s the final touch of the deceased person.’ Returning to The Touch Test itself, despite the many cultural differences across the countries’ participants, responses to the test were alike. ‘To me, these results show that we are more alike than we are different,’ says Bhuchar. ‘Greetings and so on differ, but as human beings, how we feel about touch is more similar than we might think.’

Above left: Katlego Mashiloane and Nosipho Lavuta, Ext. 2, Lakeside, Johannesburg 2007. A study of touching intimacy by artist Zanele Muholi, who documents the lives of South Africa’s black lesbian, gay, trans, queer and intersex communities Above right: Edmund de Waal’s winter pot (B10), recently shown at the Gagosian and made during lockdown 2020 specifically to be touched and held

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Three leading 20th-century names in art and design – Charlotte Perriand, Alexander Calder and Barbara Hepworth – are the subject of major exhibitions this year.

Jane Audas explores their work with those behind the shows

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CHARLOTTE PERRIAND AND ALFRED ROTH, PLACE SAINT SULPLICE, 1929 © ACHP; PHOTOGRAPHIC ARCHIVE, THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART ARCHIVES, NEW YORK. © 2020 CALDER FOUNDATION, NEW YORK/ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK; BARBARA HEPWORTH AT WORK ON THE PLASTER FOR OVAL FORM (TREZION) 1963 PHOTO: VAL WILMER © BOWNESS, HEPWORTH ESTATE

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CHARLOTTE PERRIAND

ALEXANDER CALDER

BARBARA HEPWORTH

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rom the Fauves to the Cubists, the Minimalists moved on by Modernism, steeped in Surrealism and to the Conceptualists – the 20th century saw coloured by Abstract Expressionism. Perriand and art and design progress at an electrifying pace. Hepworth knew what they wanted to do from a The stage was packed with outstanding figures, young age; both saw success in a world that revered changing the story of creative making. To stand male designers and artists. out took remarkable talent. Charlotte Perriand, Calder came to art later, treading water first in Alexander Calder and Barbara Hepworth were other fields, as a fireman in a ship’s boiler room, three such figures. and as a hydraulics and automative engineer. But They broke the surface in style, and their work when it came to their art, each pushed boundaries, continues to have huge significance remaining best in show for their today. Each started making art and mediums throughout an aesthetically Perriand (with architect, artist and design within a few years of one fickle century. Overleaf we examine writer Alfred Roth) in another. Across a century of many key notes in their practices with the 1929; Calder in 1943; and Hepworth in 1963 ‘ism’s’ all three emerged, their careers curators of the exhibitions. » THEA RTSSOCIET Y.ORG / 3 3

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Le Corbusier was a key figure in her life. They met in 1927 when

she was just 24. Their relationship, at the start, was that of pupil and teacher. Within a year, recognising her talent, but not always giving her credit for it, Le Corbusier recruited her to design furniture and interiors for his studio, Atelier de Sèvres. She worked for him for 10 years and they remained friends and collaborators.

Perriand emerged into the public eye in the late 1920s as a fully formed ‘modernist’ woman.

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Chaise longue basculante B306 in 1929. Such design is still highly sought after.

she designed a Japanese teahouse for Paris’s UNESCO garden.

Perriand was the queen of decluttering. Her most famous

At first she was all about her modern materials.

In 1929 she took on the English (establishment) writer John Gloag. He had criticised the use of metal in furniture in The Studio magazine. Perriand replied with a piece titled: ‘Wood or Metal?’ with combative lines including: ‘The Eiffel Tower could never have been made of wood.’

Her use of materials broadened, though, as she matured as a designer and particularly after her return from working in Japan.

Perriand loved Japanese design.

She had worked with the architect Junzo Sakakura at Le Corbusier’s studio. He had given her the 1906 The Book of Tea by Kakuzo Okakura and she was influenced by its ideas on simplicity. Sakakura invited Perriand to Japan to advise the trade board on selecting Japanese crafts for export. She stayed for over two years, curating and lecturing, persuading craftsmen to make new objects reflecting ‘a modern spirit and Japanese tradition’. Later, aged 90,

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erriand was born in Paris in 1903, to a tailor and a seamstress, and she died there in 1999. She created at very different scales – from table lamps to buildings. Her work has not always had the recognition its revolutionary approach deserves, but in recent years she has moved out of the shadow of her famous artistic friends and collaborators.

And, according to large auction houses, her stock is rising.

Clockwise from top left: Perriand on the Chaise longue basculante B306, 1929; La Cascade residence, Arc 1600, 1967–69; Bookcase for the Maison du Mexique, 1952; colour studies of various versions of the Fauteuil grand confort for the Villa Church, 1928

furniture designs were superlative storage solutions, like her Nuage bookcase. She felt it was important that a modern home was a spacious one and, in order to make a sense of space, you needed somewhere to put things. In her autobiography she revealed that while in Japan she discovered the power and possibility in empty spaces: ‘Emptiness contains everything.’

Perriand designed for modern life but she also lived it, splitting her

time between city life and the great outdoors. As a child she spent World War I in the Maurienne in the French Alps, an area she would return to in the 1960s. There she designed the brilliantly stepped Les Arcs, one of France’s largest ski resorts. It was, like most of Perriand’s architectural work, designed from an inside-out, human-first perspective – timeless design with a deft touch.

Charlotte Perriand: The Modern Life is curated by Justin McGuirk; opens 19 June; Design Museum, London; designmuseum.org

THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART, NEW YORK. GIFT OF ABBY ALDRICH ROCKEFELLER

Architect and queen of timeless design

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system, perhaps inspired by the discovery of Pluto in 1930. In this work, the spheres (suggesting planets) move along curved wires at different speeds. When it was first exhibited, Albert Einstein is reported to have stood transfixed in front of it for the whole 40-minute cycle.

Master of mobiles

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alder was the child of artists.

Born in 1898, his father was a sculptor, his mother a painter. He made sculptures as a child, but did not set out to be an artist. After working in engineering and as a timekeeper in a logging camp, it’s said that an experience while working on a ship started him on his path in art. Awaking on deck off the Guatemalan coast he saw a sunrise and full moon simultaneously on opposite horizons. The sight had a lasting impression on him, one he referenced throughout his life.

In 1943 MoMA held a retrospective of Calder’s work. At the time

he was the youngest artist to have one. In the upcoming 2021 show, for the first time, a rediscovered double-sided pen and brush drawing that Calder made will be shown, which illustrates the pieces he proposed might be included in that original exhibition.

By 1923 he moved to New York

Calder didn’t just make mobiles.

and enrolled at the Art Students League. He took a job illustrating for the National Police Gazette; they sent him to sketch circus scenes in 1925. He found the circus fascinating, and his love of movement and performance continued to blossom in Paris, where he travelled and, in 1926, created his inventive Cirque Calder.

This included tiny ‘performers’ and props and was designed to be manipulated manually – a piece of performance art, long before that medium was fully recognised.

He worked in wire sculpture, bronze, graphics, jewellery and more. Among his projects were sets for 1930s ballets by Erik Satie and Martha Graham. He also experimented with huge outdoor sculptures. His 14ft-high 1945 Man-Eater with Pennants was commissioned for MoMA’s sculpture garden. It is a quirky, discombobulated work and received mixed views (Barr wasn’t a fan) when it first went on show.

Four years later it was dismantled.

Only shown once since 1945, it has been conserved and will feature in this new show. Calder focused on such large-scale works through to his later years.

He died in 1976, aged 78, just a few weeks after another retrospective in New York.

To see Man-Eater with Pennants up again, for this new show, feels triumphant.

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) spotted Calder’s talent early. He

came to be one of director Alfred Barr’s favourite ‘go to’ artists and that patronage helped Calder become recognised as one of the most important American artists of the 20th century. The museum has held Calder’s work since 1930 – only months after it first opened.

By 1931 he had created his first truly kinetic sculpture – all about movement – which was considered a completely new form of art.

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Enter Marcel Duchamp. Many of

those sculptures, like A Universe, were motorised. Duchamp saw this type of Calder’s work in around 1931 and coined the term ‘mobile’ for it; the rest is history.

A Universe was the first of Calder’s works to enter MoMA’s collection.

The year was 1934. The work is an abstract vision of the cosmos.

Calder had a lifelong fascination with astronomy and the universe’s

Top: A Universe, 1934. Painted iron pipe, steel wire, motor and wood with string Above: Black Widow, 1959. Painted sheet steel

Alexander Calder: Modern from the Start is curated by Cara Manes; 7 March–7 August; MoMA, New York; moma.org

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friend Michael Tippett’s opera The Midsummer Marriage at the Royal Opera House in 1955. And there will be the chance to see some of Hepworth’s printed textiles from the 1930s in this show, including an abstract jacquard weave fabric designed for Edinburgh Weavers’ ‘Constructivist Textiles’ collection of 1937.

epworth was often criticised for being cool and restrained. But this new exhibition will reveal her passions, personal connections and interest in diverse cultural spheres throughout her life (1903–75).

Hepworth considered her art to be an affirmation of life. Although her work was contemporary, it was also looking towards the eternal.

Even now, when people look at her work, they really feel something.

Hepworth was precise on how to view a sculpture. She said one

Hepworth always kept in touch with events. She drew inspiration

Above: Hepworth at work on the plaster for Single Form, 1962

from fields not necessarily associated with fine art: music and dance, literature and poetry, politics and technology. Among her friends were scientists, surgeons, politicians, diplomats, poets and composers, with whom she kept up lively correspondences.

Left: Orpheus (Maquette 1), 1956. Brass and strings, mounted on a hardwood base

Music was a key influence.

Hepworth was always musical, winning prizes at school for her piano playing. In 1949 she met the composer Priaulx Rainier. They became friends, discussing musical and abstract forms and the interrelationship between the two.

Hepworth made several works that had musical terms in their titles, including her sculpture for the Festival of Britain, Contrapuntal Forms (Motet). Listening to Hepworth and her assistants carving the work (at Hepworth’s studio), Rainier composed Rhythms of the Stones, inspired by the sounds of their hammering.

Below: the rosewood Kneeling Figure, 1932

designs will be on show in the exhibition. These will include drawings from the war years, when she couldn’t get the materials to sculpt with, and which she described as being sculptures, but in the guise of two dimensions.

Hepworth’s two-dimensional work is much less well known than her

She explored other mediums too.

sculptures. Many of her rarely seen drawings, paintings and fabric

She designed costumes and sets for the first production of her

shouldn’t view a work from one direction. You have to move around the piece and interact with it. She was obsessed with how the physical encounter with sculpture could impact the viewer. In her 1966 book, Drawings from a Sculptor’s Landscape, she wrote: ‘Sculpture is a three-dimensional projection of primitive feeling: touch, texture, size and scale, hardness and warmth, evocation and compulsion to move, live, and love.’ She had a unique artistic vision, and it’s because of this that we need to look again at her work, in depth.

Many people assumed that Hepworth was Henry Moore’s pupil.

Hepworth attended college with Moore; her career ran in parallel with his. The 2011 opening of The Hepworth Wakefield placed her firmly front and centre with her Yorkshire contemporary.

Ten years on, we have growing recognition of the work of female artists; this exhibition will show that Hepworth, her work and her story are more relevant than ever.

Barbara Hepworth: Art and Life is curated by Eleanor Clayton; 21 May– 31 October; The Hepworth Wakefield, Yorkshire; hepworthwakefield.org A Sky Arts documentary on the artist plays this spring; the book Barbara Hepworth: Art & Life, by Eleanor Clayton, is published by Thames & Hudson.

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ARTS SOCIETY LECTURERS ROUND-UP A SELECTION OF OUR LECTURERS REVEAL THEIR CURRENT TALKS AND COURSES

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NEW ONLINE OR IN-PERSON LECTURES

CULTURAL TRAVELS FROM HOME & ONLINE LECTURES

The Top 20 most popular artworks in Britain today / Banksy and Basquiat: Superstars of Street Art / Painting the ups and downs of the Circus / Star-crossed lovers Paolo and Francesca in pictures and poems / Vanessa Bell’s art and tangled Bloomsbury Group relationships.

07867 318616; rwwarburton@btinternet.com

Enjoy live walking tours, real-time gallery visits and exclusive museum openings around the world, including Venice, Budapest, Milan and Assisi. Book one of Siân’s interactive, online events or lectures now. Prices from £10.

For latest events and booking, visit arthistoryinfocus.com/courses

LISTENING CLUB WITH SANDY – CLASSICAL MUSIC EXPLAINED

ART HISTORIAN, LECTURER, PRIVATE MUSEUM TOURS

Ray Warburton OBE

Sandy Burnett

PRODUCTION

As well as his Arts Society lectures on everything from opera to jazz, Sandy Burnett’s Zoom Listening Club courses unlock the world of classical music, with context, insights and questions answered in an informal atmosphere. sandyburnett.com/listeningclub

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LIVE ONLINE LECTURES AND RECITALS Peter Medhurst

Upcoming events include: Passion and Resurrection in Handel’s Messiah, The World of the Young Mozart in the 1760s, Music in Art, a live Passiontide concert on Palm Sunday, and a live recital on a 1750 John Snetzler organ.

Information and booking: petermedhurst.com/arts

STUDY DAY: THE ROYAL OPERA HOUSE – AN INSIDE VIEW Nigel Bates

A highly engaging two- or three-part Study Day presented by an experienced lecturer, performer and administrator who has an association of more than 40 years with Covent Garden. Includes audio and video clips. nigelbates.net

Siân Walters

Anne Haworth

New lecture: Treasures from Mines and Mountains: Magnificent Artistry in Rock Crystal New Study Day: The Artisans of Venice Lecture or Study Day: The Phoenix at the Fall of Empire, Three Empresses of China More information on my new website, annemhaworth.co.uk

DISCOVER INDIAN ART Georgina Bexon FRSA

The art of India is full of exuberance, sensuality and, above all, colour. Georgina’s talks span the centuries, from the early rock art of the Indus Valley to the glories of Mughal painting and the wonderful vibrancy of India’s modern art. georginabexon.com georginabexon@me.com

THE LEGACY OF SPAIN’S VANISHED KINGDOM Ian Cockburn

The Islamic kingdom of al-Andalus lasted 800 years and enjoyed a rich and varied material culture.

My lectures explore the history of this vanished civilisation through surviving examples of its exotic architecture, silks, ivories, bronzes and ceramics. ian@artandculturetravel.com

For information on future events and talks, see theartssociety.org/events

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SPONSORED CONTENT

ARTS SOCIETY FEATURES AND NEWS, PLUS OUR WHAT’S ON LISTINGS AND SPECIAL OFFERS REPRO OP

DON’T MISS

SUBS PRODUCTION CLIENT

PHOTO BY IMOGEN CUNNINGHAM © 2020 IMOGEN CUNNINGHAM TRUST. ARTWORK © ESTATE OF RUTH ASAWA, COURTESY DAVID ZWIRNER

ART

Abstract sculptor Ruth Asawa (1926–2013) was born in California to immigrant farmers from Japan. Her childhood included internment, and she later became a student at the Black Mountain College in North Carolina.

This 1963 photograph shows her with some of the delicate tied-wire sculptures for which she was gaining recognition.

Asawa’s philosophy was that ‘Art will make people better, more highly skilled in thinking and improving whatever business one goes into, or whatever occupation. It makes a person broader.’

Discover more at Modern Art Oxford’s Citizen of the Universe, the first public solo exhibition of her work in Europe.

— Dates to be confirmed modernartoxford.org.uk

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Among the many ways The Arts Society gives back to local communities, there is one initiative that is especially rewarding for all involved – the Trails of Discovery. This work helps to connect diverse community groups with their local heritage.

Elizabeth Oliver finds out more

ART

ILLUSTRATION: ELEANOR SHAKESPEARE

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reated and run by Arts Society Volunteers, Trails of Discovery helps engage community groups of all ages with the artistic and historic heritage of their locality, from places of worship to historic houses. Inspiration and stimulation are key: trails encourage participants to look closer at artefacts around them, to spark interest and conversation. They may be asked to find a specific detail within a stained-glass window, look out for particular flora in a historic garden, or identify the name of a statue within their local area.

The initiative began in the 2000s as Church Trails – later Children’s Trails – and was designed to connect children with the stories within local religious buildings. The first trail was registered by the former South Lakeland DFAS at St Mary’s Church, Kirkby Lonsdale in 2007. In 2017, when The Arts Society widened its remit to all aspects of the arts, the trails were rebranded as Trails of Discovery and expanded. ‘The Arts

Society was broadening, and we wanted to engage with more people and members,’ Pauline Stewart, National Head of Trails of Discovery, explains.

Under Pauline’s direction, trails have since been created for buildings, as well as town tours. In 2019, The Arts Society South Devon launched a trail around Plymouth Hoe, taking in landmarks such as the Mayflower Steps, Drake’s Statue and Smeaton’s Tower. Another development has been the creation of Memory Trails, designed for people living with dementia and their families or carers.

Created to prompt conversation and evoke memories, the trails ask participants simple questions: to describe, for instance, the feel of a door, or look of a church organ, or to discuss their favourite music.

‘The trails have been created with the help of psychiatric and dementia professionals, and it’s wonderful to hear people spurred by them to reminisce about their past, recalling

‘IN RESPONSE TO THE CORONAVIRUS CRISIS, PAULINE AND HER TEAM HAVE ALSO LAUNCHED NEIGHBOURHOOD TRAILS, WHICH ENCOURAGE PARTICIPANTS TO EXPLORE THEIR LOCAL AREA’ 40 / T HE A RTSS O C IE TY.O RG

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Trailblazers, 1

OUR WORK

how they used to play the piano or sing in a choir,’ Pauline says. Moments like these are just some of the reasons why being involved in Trails of Discovery is rewarding. While raising awareness of The Arts Society’s work, the trails also benefit the buildings. ‘Some of the churches we’ve created trails for have also applied for National Lottery Heritage Funding,’ Pauline adds.

‘Having the trails in place helps their application, as it shows people are encouraged to visit.’

In response to the coronavirus crisis, Pauline and her team have also launched Neighbourhood Trails, which encourage participants to explore their local area. Another exciting development has been the launch of QR codes, which are printed on trail posters. ‘Participants can use their smartphone or tablet to scan the QR code on the poster to download a digital version of the trail onto their device,’ Pauline explains. ‘Not only is this more environmentally friendly, it means the trails can be accessed by a larger audience.’ She is grateful to the team of Trails of Discovery Volunteers who promote and develop the trails.

‘Their work has true impact,’ she says.

Turn the page to find out more about three such trails.

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‘SOME OF THE CHURCHES WE’VE CREATED TRAILS FOR HAVE ALSO APPLIED FOR NATIONAL LOTTERY HERITAGE FUNDING. HAVING THE TRAILS IN PLACE HELPS THEIR APPLICATION, AS IT SHOWS PEOPLE ARE ENCOURAGED TO VISIT’

ART PRODUCTION CLIENT

A SPECIAL COMMEMORATION

SPARKING CONVERSATION

MAYFLOWER CONNECTIONS

Abbot’s Hospital, Guildford

Temple Balsall, Solihull

All Saints’ Church, Babworth

To mark the 400th anniversary of Abbot’s Hospital in 2019, The Arts Society West Surrey Area designed three trails, including a Family, Children’s and Memory Trail.

Located at the top of Guildford High Street, the Grade I listed building provides sheltered accommodation for up to 27 residents.

Areas of the hospital are accessible to the public on select open days. ‘The buildings, courtyard and grounds are beautiful,’ Sara Scott, Trails of Discovery Representative for The Arts Society West Surrey Area, says, ‘and participants on the trails are encouraged to spot historic details, such as the decorative chimneys and the niches for bee skeps in the garden.’

While the trails can only be completed on pre-booked visits, Sara explains that she was especially pleased with the response to the Memory Trail, which was launched in conjunction with a care home in 2019. ‘It was wonderful to hear participants talk about the past and local history,’ she says. ‘It was exactly what we hoped to achieve.’

Keen to celebrate the heritage of Temple Balsall in Solihull – a site with origins dating back to the 12th century – members of The Arts Societies of Arden, Solihull and Royal Leamington Spa combined forces to create a Memory and Sensory Trail.

Taking in the site’s court and St Mary’s Church, the trail prompts users to describe the trees and flowers that are growing in the grounds and discuss the colours they see in a stained-glass window. ‘We try to promote discussion through open-ended questions,’ say Sheila Williams and Rosemary JewelClark, Trails of Discovery Representatives for The Arts Society West Midlands Area.

For both, a successful Memory and Sensory Trail should provide stimulation and comfort and encourage interaction. ‘These trails are important for participants’ mental, physical and social wellbeing, as they encourage them to reminisce, which helps to open up channels of communication.’

Sheila and Rosemary are eager to encourage more Arts Societies to work together on projects. ‘Through collaboration, we can share good practice, and enable initiatives to happen.’

With historical links to the Pilgrim Fathers, All Saints’ Church at Babworth in Nottinghamshire was the perfect choice for The Arts Society Dukeries’ first Church Trail. Initially created in 2013, the trail was updated in 2019 by a team of volunteers, to commemorate the 2020 400th Mayflower anniversary.

The new trail has artefacts for children to discover, including a model of the Mayflower made out of 14,000 matchsticks.

‘The children particularly enjoy looking out for the carvings of little wooden mice in the chancel, the work of the well-known furniture maker Robert Thompson,’ explains Gill Murphy, Trails of Discovery Representative for The Arts Society East Midlands Area.

She adds that the children’s excitement is always rewarding. ‘It’s great to see them working together as a team and having fun.’

FIND OUT MORE Keen to get involved? If you’d like to know more, visit trails.theartssociety.org or email volunteering@theartssociety.org

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Our guide to this season’s arts and culture events, including ‘virtual visits’ LONDON

Unearthed: Photography’s Roots Dulwich Picture Gallery UNTIL 9 MAY

SUBS ART

The history of photography charted through depictions of nature from 1840 to the present day. dulwichpicturegallery. org.uk T: 020 8693 5254 _

Jean Dubuffet: Brutal Beauty Barbican UNTIL 23 MAY PRODUCTION

An exhibition highlighting the work of French artist Jean Dubuffet, an early champion of ‘Art Brut’ or raw art, and one of the most powerful and provocative forces in the post-war avant-garde. barbican.org.uk T: 020 7638 4141 _

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Ai Weiwei: History of Bombs Imperial War Museum UNTIL 23 MAY

For news of The Arts Society events near you see theartssociety.org/ events For our monthly ‘top 5 events’ and ‘Instant Expert’ e-talks, sign up at theartssociety.org/ signup *Details correct at time of going to print; please check with all sites before you visit

As part of the museum’s Refugees season, Ai Weiwei takes over the atrium with a new sitespecific artwork – the first time that it’s been given over to one artist. iwm.org.uk T: 020 7416 5000 _

Eileen Agar: Angel of Anarchy Whitechapel Gallery UNTIL 23 MAY

A major retrospective of the work of Eileen Agar, who synthesised two

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of the 20th century’s biggest art styles: Cubism and Surrealism. whitechapelgallery.org T: 020 7522 7888 _

Epic Iran V&A Museum UNTIL 12 SEPT

The first UK show in 90 years to present an overarching narrative spanning 5,000 years of Iranian art, design and culture. vam.ac.uk T: 020 7942 2000 _

150 Years of the Royal Albert Hall Royal Albert Hall VARIOUS DATES FROM 29 MAR

The hall marks its 150th anniversary with events including a new staging of Matthew Bourne’s ballet The Car Man, and concerts with Patti Smith, Gregory Porter and Jonas Kaufmann. royalalberthall.com T: 020 7589 8212 _

Rubens: Reuniting the Great Landscapes The Wallace Collection 21 APR–15 AUG

A show that brings two masterpieces – The Rainbow Landscape and A View of Het Steen in the Early Morning, painted as a companion pair – back together. wallacecollection.org T: 020 7560 9500 _

The EY Exhibition: The Making of Rodin Tate Modern

DON’T MISS

REFLECTIONS: CONTEMPORARY ART OF THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA British Museum, London UNTIL 15 AUG

This major exhibition features over 100 works from artists born in, or with links to, countries from Iran to Morocco. Pictured here is Al-Sitt and her Sunglasses, a 2008 collagen acrylic on paper work by artist Huda Lutfi (b.1948). britishmuseum.org; T: 020 7323 8000

29 APR–31 OCT

Gretchen Peters

Although best known for his bronze and marble sculptures, Rodin’s greatest skill was as a modeller who captured movement in clay and plaster. This exhibition highlights the role of the latter in his practice. tate.org.uk T: 020 7887 8888 _

Kings Place

London Design Biennale 2021 Somerset House 1–27 JUN

A collection of the world’s most innovative designers, curators and design institutions. somersethouse.org.uk T: 020 7845 4600

7 AND 14 JUN

Nashville singer-songwriter Gretchen Peters takes the art of storytelling in song to new heights. Hear her in the intimate surroundings of Kings Place. kingsplace.co.uk T: 020 7520 1490

THE SOUTH AND EAST OF ENGLAND

Rock Against Racism: Militant Entertainment, 1976–82 De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill DATES TO BE CONFIRMED

Celebrating one of the most important British

FUNDED BY CAMMEA

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SPRING 2021

Camden Art Centre, London; until 6 Jun The first major UK institutional exhibition by African-American artist Walter Price (b.1989), whose practice is known for pushing the mediums of painting and drawing. Seen here is his The fate of animals, 2019. camdenartcentre.org; T: 020 7472 5500

grass-roots cultural movements of the 20th century. It involved bands like Aswad, The Clash, The Specials and X-Ray Spex. dlwp.com T: 01424 229111 _

Bridget Riley: Pleasures of Sight The Lightbox, Woking DATES TO BE CONFIRMED

Marking the artist’s 90th birthday with a selection of her striped, curved, colour and black and white works. thelightbox.org.uk T: 01483 737800 _

Seaside Modern: Art and Life on the Beach

A chance to see work by some of the greatest European artists of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Includes prints from Picasso and Cézanne, abstract works from Klee and Soulages, and portraits

by Degas and Manet. pallant.org.uk T: 01243 774557 _

Ian Shaw and Liane Carroll St Mary in the Castle, Hastings 30 APR

Celebrate International Jazz Day at St Mary in the Castle with two of the UK’s greatest singer pianists.

Die Zauberflöte

UNTIL 1 MAY

Glyndebourne

John Nash: The Landscape of Love and Solace

Mozart’s magical comedy centred on a gallant hero, a kidnapped princess and a mischievous sidekick, staged in this particularly fantasy-filled production. glyndebourne.com T: 01273 812321

Look to the sky in an exhibition featuring the work of Paul Nash, Albrecht Dürer and Rembrandt, among others. museumsworcestershire. org.uk T: 01905 25371 _

20 MAY–29 AUG

1 MAY–26 SEPT

Although often overshadowed by his brother Paul, John Nash was one of the most versatile and prolific artists of the last century, despite having no formal art school training. This is the most comprehensive exhibition of his work for 50 years. townereastbourne.org.uk T: 01323 434670

Hastings Contemporary DATES TO BE CONFIRMED

Taking as its starting point the early 1900s, this is an exploration of a half-century of artistic expression at the seaside, curated by Arts Society Lecturer James Russell. hastingscontemporary.org T: 01424 728377 _

Degas to Picasso: International Modern Masters Pallant House, Chichester UNTIL 18 APR

The New Art Gallery Walsall DATES TO BE CONFIRMED

The first exhibition of landscape paintings

by Yasmin David, the daughter of Laurie Lee. Her work was never shown in her lifetime, but hundreds of lost works have since been discovered. thenewartgallerywalsall. org.uk T: 01922 654400 _

UNTIL 1 MAY

DON’T MISS

ANTHONY GROSS

Goldmark Gallery, Uppingham SPRING DATES TO BE CONFIRMED

Long considered a doyen of British etching, the painter, printmaker, animator and illustrator Anthony Gross was also an official war artist of World War II and a gifted landscape painter.

This is his Bayou Landscape, soon to be on show at Goldmark Gallery in Rutland, an Arts Society affiliate partner. goldmarkart.com; 01572 821424

JAY GOLDMARK/GOLDMARK GALLERY

Patchwork, applique, embroidery – a special opportunity to see textile works from the castle’s collection. museums.norfolk.gov.uk T: 01603 493625 _

UNTIL 6 JUN

Yasmin David: Into the Light

20-21 Visual Arts Centre, Scunthorpe

Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery

British Art Show 9 Wolverhampton Art Gallery

THE MIDLANDS

Misshapes: The Making of Tatty Devine

Textile Treasures

UNTIL 21 MAR

W H AT ’ S O N

ryejazz.com E: kate@ryejazz.com _

Towner Eastbourne

What's On, 1

COURTESY: GREENE NAFTALI

Walter Price – Pearl Lines

The first solo show about jewellery makers Rosie Wolfenden and Harriet Vine, co-founders of Tatty Devine.

Includes jewellery, sketchbooks, photos and two specially commissioned films.

2021visualartscentre.co.uk T: 01724 297070 _

Skyscape Exhibition Worcester City Art Gallery and Museum

Wolverhampton has been chosen as the first city to host the British Art Show in 2021. This is the largest touring exhibition of contemporary art in the UK, featuring the work of over 40 artists. www.wolverhamptonart. org.uk T: 01902 552055 _

Coventry, City of Culture 2021 Various venues FROM 15 MAY

Coventry Moves, a spectacular performance and celebration involving the people of Coventry, opens the city’s year of culture. coventry2021.co.uk T: 0344 581 4950 _

Allison Katz: Artery Nottingham Contemporary 15 MAY–31 OCT

The first international solo show for Canadian artist Allison Katz, whose work taps into puns and language games. nottinghamcontemporary. org T: 0115 948 9750

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SPRING 2021

Our guide to this season’s arts and culture events, including ‘virtual visits’

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Storiel, Bangor

chapter.org; artesmundi.org T: 0300 7777 300 _

UNTIL 27 MAR

Amy Wadge

A look at Storiel’s doll collection, from Victorian examples to 1960s Sindy and Welsh costume dolls, many made by local craftsmen or parents for their children. www.storiel.cymru T: 01248 353368 _

St David’s Hall, Cardiff

WALES

Dolls

Artes Mundi 9 Chapter, Cardiff UNTIL 6 JUN

PRODUCTION

Spread over three sites, this exhibition brings together some of the world’s most celebrated contemporary artists.

3 APR

Singer-songwriter Amy Wadge kicks off her tour. The artist has collaborated with some of the biggest names in contemporary music and her songs provided the soundtrack for the TV series Keeping Faith. stdavidshallcardiff.co.uk T: 07743 839816/ 07391 791934

CLIENT

Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery, Exeter

NICHOLAS POPE/MR AND MRS POPE VASED AND FLOWERED 2016 GLASS

DATES TO BE CONFIRMED

Five contemporary artists highlight worldwide efforts to save endangered species from extinction. rammuseum.org.uk T: 01392 265858 _

CANALETTO PAINTING VENICE / NICHOLAS POPE: MR AND MRS POPE AS… The Holburne Museum, Bath UNTIL 5 SEPT / 10 APR–SEPT

Two fascinating shows to note: a once-in-alifetime opportunity to see Canaletto’s most important set of Venice paintings and, in a separate show, work by Nicholas Pope, one of Britain’s most original and underrated artists. holburne.org; T: 01225 388569

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From holiday camps to hotels, sandcastles to surf, a show that looks at the relationship between photography and the British seaside from the 1950s to the present.

Featuring work from, among others, Jane Brown, Martin Parr and Henri Cartier Bresson. newlynartgallery.co.uk T: 01736 363715 _

The Sharon Shannon Quartet Lighthouse, Poole Centre for the Arts 28 APR

THE WEST OF ENGLAND

Seedscapes: Future-proofing Nature

DON’T MISS

UNTIL 5 JUN

Hidden Highlights: Life in Lockdown Russell-Cotes Art Gallery, Bournemouth UNTIL 18 APR

Over 80 works from the Russell-Cotes collection, reinterpreted through the lens of lockdown. russellcotes.com T: 01202 451858 _

Accordion virtuoso Sharon Shannon has performed at the White House and played with global superstars Willie Nelson, Nigel Kennedy and Alison Krauss. lighthousepoole.co.uk T: 01202 280000 _

Petrit Halilaj Tate St Ives 29 MAY–10 OCT

Kosovan artist Petrit Halilaj investigates themes of cultural identity, nationhood, heritage and personal and political freedom. Includes drawings made in a refugee camp in Albania when he was 13. tate.org.uk T: 01736 796226

THE NORTH OF ENGLAND

Seaside: Photographed

Liverpool Biennial

Newlyn Art Gallery and Exchange

Tate Liverpool 20 MAR–6 JUN

The largest festival of contemporary art in the UK, with free exhibitions in public spaces, galleries and museums all over the city and online. tate.org.uk/Liverpool T: 0151 702 7400 _

North Country Quilts: In Celebration of New Acquisitions The Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle 20 MAR–19 SEPT

Quilting traditions of northern England, showcasing historical and contemporary examples of the art. thebowesmuseum.org.uk T: 01833 690606 _

The House of the Setting Sun Blackwell, Windermere 26 MAR–10 OCT

Exploring the interchange between traditional Japanese design and the British Arts and Crafts Movement; expect beautiful woodblock prints and ceramics. blackwell.org.uk T: 01539 446139 _

Ad Minoliti BALTIC, Gateshead 1 APR–13 MAR

Argentine painter Ad Minoliti’s first institutional exhibition in Europe uses feminist and queer theory to interpret painting, design, architecture, art history and visual language. balticmill.com T: 0191 478 1810

ARCHIE BRENNAN/ DOVECOT STUDIOS

Rachel Kneebone: 399 Days

City Art Centre, Edinburgh 15 MAY–10 OCT

The Chapel, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield

DON’T MISS

FROM 1 MAY

ARCHIE BRENNAN: TAPESTRY GOES POP!

Rachel Kneebone works primarily in porcelain to create complex, delicate objects. 399 Days is her most ambitious and monumental work to date, the title referring to the length of time it took to create. ysp.org.uk T: 01924 832631

SCOTLAND

New Thinking, New Collecting National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh UNTIL 31 MAY

A selection of work from the Scottish history and archaeology collections. nms.ac.uk T: 0300 123 6789 _

Paolozzi Studio Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh

IMAGE FROM HAY FESTIVAL/CREDIT: SAM HARDWICK

UNTIL 5 SEPT

Dovecot Studios, Edinburgh 26 MAR–26 JUN

The story of Edinburgh native Archie Brennan, pop artist, weaver and former Mr Scotland, bringing together over 80 tapestries including this, his Muhammed Ali, 1973. dovecotstudios.com; T: 0131 5503660

Inspired by French Symbolism, the Celtic Revivalists and the European landscape, Mackie produced works in a range of media, from oil painting to woodblock prints and sculpture. edinburghmuseums.org.uk T: 0131 529 3993 _

Tracey Emin / Rachel Maclean

a show that explores the relationship between club culture and design. vam.ac.uk/Dundee T: 01382 411 611 _

Night Fever: Designing Club Culture

29 APR–2 MAY

V&A Dundee 27 MAR–5 SEPT

From New York’s Studio 54 to Manchester’s Hacienda and London’s Ministry of Sound,

ENJOY MORE ART ONLINE

Shetland Folk Festival Various venues The UK’s most northerly folk festival. shetlandfolkfestival.com T: 01595 694757 _

Charles H. Mackie: Colour and Light

Virtual Tours National Museums Liverpool

Museum from Home

ONGOING

Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museums

Explore Liverpool’s museums with these virtual tours, including a look round the Walker Gallery’s Pre-Raphaelite and Victorian art. liverpoolmuseums.org.uk _

ONGOING

The gallery’s online music and art programme includes specially composed pieces by freelance clarinettist Joanna Nicholson, inspired by works in the gallery by artists including Tracey Emin and Eric Ravilious. aberdeencity.gov.uk

Curator’s Tour: Grayson’s Art Club Manchester Art Gallery ONGOING

During the first 2020 lockdown, Grayson Perry brought us his

NORTHERN IRELAND

series Grayson’s Art Club. The show discovered unknown talents, whose work is on show alongside pieces by the artist. manchesterartgallery.org _

Opera at Home ONGOING

Watch operas and arias from home. Beethoven’s Fidelio is available until 22 April, while Monday Motivation sessions provide opera workshops and design challenges. garsingtonopera.org

Discover art by local creatives sharing their art, film and music on the virtual gallery space. islandartscentre.com E: arts.information@ lisburncastlereagh.gov.uk _

Renoir and the New Era: Impressionists works from The Courtauld UNTIL 11 APR

The sculpture park hosts Tracey Emin’s first Scottish show for 13 years, while a cartoon princess called Mimi will invite visitors into an apparently abandoned toy shop, created in the woods by multimedia artist Rachel Maclean. jupiterartland.org T: 01506 889900

ISLAND Arts Virtual Gallery

ONGOING

Ulster Museum, Belfast

Jupiter Artland, Edinburgh 28 MAY–26 SEPT

An insight into the ways of working of Sir Eduardo Paolozzi, who was one of post-war Britain’s most versatile sculptors. nationalgalleries.org T: 0131 624 6200 _

ISLAND Arts Centre, Lisburn

As well as Renoir, the exhibition includes works from Manet, Pissarro and Morisot. nmni.com T: 028 9044 0000 _

Van Morrison Millennium Forum, Derry 30 APR–1 MAY

Multi-award-winning musician Van Morrison returns to play two dates rescheduled from May 2020. millenniumforum.co.uk T: 028 7126 4455

Hay Festival Hay-on-Wye 27 MAY–6 JUN

While waiting to see if this year’s festival goes ahead in physical form, whet your appetite by reliving last year’s digital festival highlights online. hayfestival.com

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Upcoming Study Days, courses and events from The Arts Society GREATER LONDON

Modern Art and the Old Masters: tradition and innovation 18 MAR, 10AM–1PM

SUBS ART

Tutor: Valerie Woodgate Comparing Old Master paintings with modern treatment of the same subjects, and examining the extent to which modern art is inspired by the example of earlier eras.

Via Zoom £20 E: Shahida0504@ outlook.com

EAST SURREY PRODUCTION

Castles – ancient and modern and creating Windsor Castle, a step-by-step guide

CLIENT

An online special interest morning 7 MAY, 10.30AM

Thank you for supporting Arts Society activity during Covid-19.

Please be aware that cancellation or postponement is still possible, according to government advice.

These events are just a taster of those on offer: book the latest on our Society and Area sites.

For more, see theartssociety.org/studydays-and-courses or call 020 7430 0730

Tutor: Dr Jonathan Foyle Architectural historian and BBC presenter Jonathan Foyle reveals the shifting associations in castle design and purpose over the past 1,000 years; he also looks at the story of Windsor Castle, breaking down this national landmark’s evolution into seminal moments.

For details on price, contact below E: ciao2005@hotmail.co.uk T: 07758 097003

WEST SURREY

The Age of Jazz 8 MAY, 4PM

Tutor: Sandy Burnett In collaboration with

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Guildford Jazz Festival 2021, discover the stories of the origins and early years of jazz, with one of the UK’s most authoritative broadcasters on music, Sandy Burnett.

The Electric Theatre, Onslow Street, Guildford, Surrey £15 (cream tea) E: wsasid1@gmail.com T: 01344 455679

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SPECIAL COURSES

The Newlyn School 17 AND 18 MAR, 10.15AM-3PM

Tutor: Catherine Wallace Discover the stories of the artists who settled in Newlyn and St Ives in the late 19th century, drawing on scenes of life there, earning them the name, the Newlyn School.

Via Zoom, three lectures each day £15 per day, per household E: j_m_price@ btinternet.com T: 01380 816510 _

The art and culture of the Aztecs, Maya and Incas 14–15 AND 28–29 APR, 10.15AM–3PM

Tutor: Chloe Sayer Two days exploring the artistic and cultural achievements of these ancient civilisations.

Market Lavington Community Hall, Wiltshire £30 (coffee, a light lunch and a glass of wine) E: j_m_price@ btinternet.com T: 01380 816510

SOUTH WEST

FROM HOLBEIN TO HOCKNEY: A HISTORY OF BRITISH PORTRAIT PAINTING 30 JUN, 10AM–3.30PM

Tutor: Valerie Woodgate

This striking work is a self-portrait by artist Julian Opie, who has a major solo exhibition opening at Pitzhanger Manor & Gallery, London this spring (18 March–1 August; check pitzhanger. org.uk for up-to-date information). Portrait painting has been more prolific in Britain than anywhere else in Europe. In this Study Day the reasons for this will be explored, while lecturer Valerie Woodgate will lead you to consider how artists reveal information in these works – about the sitter and the societal circumstances in which they were painted. The artistic changes in portraiture over several centuries will also be investigated.

Buckfast Abbey Conference Centre, Buckfastleigh, Devon £39 (coffee and buffet lunch) E: sarah.swstudydays@gmail.com; T: 01398 341973

Study Days, 1 SUSSEX

From magic lanterns to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer: the birth of the silver screen and the artists it inspired

© MUSEO THYSSEN-BORNEMISZA, MADRID

Albrecht Dürer Christ Among the Doctors, 1506.

Oil on panel, 64.3 x 80.3cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid (1934.38)

£38 (morning coffee and a light lunch) E: meganbashir@ btinternet.com T: 01277 374314

SOUTH WEST

4 MAY, 10.30AM–3PM

Tutor: Geri Parlby Look back to Hollywood’s golden era: explore the development of the film industry, and how it changed entertainment and inspired the greatest artists of the early 20th century.

The Ark, Mount Lane, Turners Hill, West Sussex £35 (coffee, lunch with wine and coffee); £20 (coffee on arrival) E: sussexarea@ theartssociety.org T: 01903 742610

ESSEX

Beethoven at 250 and a half 5 JUL, 10AM–2.30PM

SHUTTERSTOCK

Tutor: Sandy Burnett Sandy Burnett explores the tale of Beethoven, the man who ‘tore up the rule book of classical music’.

Little Baddow Memorial Hall, Little Baddow, Chelmsford

Decoding art – a guide to art history Study course 30 APR, 7, 14, 21 AND 28 MAY, 10.30AM–3.30PM

Tutors: Geri Parlby and Jeni Fraser The birth and flowering of the Renaissance period, from Duccio in early-14thcentury Sienna to the 16th century, covering France, Germany and England. Includes lectures Fifty Shades of Blue and Mass & Form – sculpture from Rodin to the present day.

Exeter Library, Castle Street, Exeter £130 E: ridge.farm@ btconnect.com

HAMPSHIRE AND ISLE OF WIGHT

From Samarkand to the Taj Mahal: Central Asia and the Great Mughals 19 MAR, 10.30AM–3PM

GREATER LONDON

DÜRER’S JOURNEYS: TRAVELS OF A RENAISSANCE ARTIST 10, 17 AND 24 MAR, 10AM-12PM

Tutor: Clare Ford-Wille

In July 1520 Dürer embarked on his last journey to the Netherlands. The National Gallery is planning The Credit Suisse Exhibition: Dürer’s Journeys: Travels of a Renaissance Artist (dates to be confirmed; nationalgallery.org.uk). The show will explore that last, and Dürer’s other journeys, and this Study Day will illuminate the stories of those travels.

Via Zoom £10 per lecture; £25 for all three E: susanbranfield@waitrose.com

Both a digital and in-person event Tutor: Sue Rollin The second Study Day in the series Far Horizons and Glittering Empires.

Under Tamerlane and his successors, Central Asia had a golden age.

Samarkand and other cities were endowed with monuments, art and literature, and science flourished. Babur, the last of the Timurids, expelled from his homeland, went on to conquer India and found the Mughal empire.

There, emperors presided over royal courts and

sponsored creative building, which reached its apogee in the Taj Mahal.

The Discovery Centre, Jewry St, Winchester (limited numbers) and also online via Zoom £30 for venue attendees (pre-booked lunch at additional cost); £15 for online attendees E: hiowsd2@gmail.com T: 01264 358065 _

The Phoenix at the Fall of Empire 16 APR, 10.30AM–3PM

Both a digital and in-person event Tutor: Anne Haworth The third and final Study

Day in the series Far Horizons and Glittering Empires. In Ancient China, the phoenix symbolised the empress, consort to the Dragon Emperor. This day focuses on three empresses who lived in the Forbidden City from the 18th century to the end of empire in 1911.

The Discovery Centre (as before) (limited numbers) and also online via Zoom £30 for venue attendees (pre-booked lunch at additional cost); £15 for online attendees E: hiowsd2@gmail.com T: 01264 358065

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Wide horizons

If you’re planning ahead for new cultural adventures, The Arts Society’s affiliated partner, Travel Editions, offers keen explorers some very special experiences

W

hether exploring Minoan Crete or Florida’s Art Deco delights, the villas and gardens of Rome or the historic trail from Delphi to Macedonia, Travel Editions has been providing discerning travellers with a rich variety of escorted group tours for over 25 years. Known for the quality of its cultural arts and history programme, Travel Editions promises an imaginative, inspirational selection of new experiences – from walking holidays to picturesque train journeys, food to music, architecture to gardens

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– all expertly curated and led in some of the world’s most beautiful places. What’s more, Travel Editions’ attention to detail and friendly, tailor-made service means each client is welcomed not as a tourist, but as an explorer.

With over 180 tours to choose from, there is an experience to satisfy every taste and interest.

Gastronomes, for instance, could discover the cuisine of their choice in situ, with tastings and demonstrations in locations from the Basque Country to Sicily. Music lovers, meanwhile, can enjoy special

‘WHAT COULD BE BETTER THAN TO FEEL THE SUN ON YOUR FACE, AS EXPERT GUIDES LEAD YOU THROUGH GARDENS AND FLOWER-STREWN MOUNTAINS?’

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Discover Minoan culture in Santorini (left), explore historic Delphi in Greece (below) or marvel at the Art Deco architecture in Miami, Florida (below left)

events, such as the Three Choirs Festival in Worcester later this year, or the lyrical magic of Andrea Bocelli as he sings under balmy Tuscan skies.

And if you’re a plant lover, what could be better than to feel the sun on your face, as expert guides lead you through gardens and flowerstrewn mountains, from the glorious Cotswolds to untamed Greece?

This spring, we’ve never been more ready to start planning future travel once again, yet with the need for safety front-of-mind. Travel Editions follows an exacting range of safety protocols and offers an insurance policy that includes Covid-19 cover, providing peace of mind for those travelling with the company. All this means spring 2021 is the ideal time to say goodbye at last to armchair travel and to begin instead to start planning your next real-time adventure.

THREE OF THE BEST GARDENS GALORE Enjoy a summer evening tour of beautiful RHS Garden Rosemoor in Devon, in an experience not usually open to the public.

This will be part of a three-day trip, led

by David Hurrion of BBC Gardeners’ World magazine. The West Country adventure also includes Sir Edwin Lutyens’ Hestercombe Gardens, Marwood Hill Gardens, with its private lakeside landscaping, and the pleasure grounds of Arlington Court – once home to generations of the same family for 500 years.

BASQUE COUNTRY FEASTING Explore the mouth-watering cuisine of Spain’s distinctive Basque region, an area with its own unique culture, language and dishes. Based in its foodie capital, San Sebastian – home to no fewer than three Michelin 3-star restaurants – you’ll visit authentic markets and meet local suppliers, take a tour of pintxos (small snack) bars and learn how to cook classic Basque dishes – all in the company of local guides who are passionate about their region.

DIVINE DECO Fly to Florida for a special nine-day tour charting the evolution of Art Deco architecture, from the pastel-coloured houses, lavish hotels and follies of Miami to the faded glamour of Fort Myers, and Tampa, with its world-beating Frank Lloyd Wright collection. Your guide is expert Mike Hope, author of Art Deco Architecture: The Interwar Period.

Established

1994

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Travel Editions has been working with The Arts Society since 1994.

To discover more about the tours, call 020 7251 0045 for the latest brochure, email tours@traveleditions.co.uk or see traveleditions.co.uk

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ADVERTORIAL

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YOUR SOCIETIES

Societies news and messages from our Patron and Chair

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MARINA RENEE-CEMMICK

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FROM OUR PATRON

Her Royal Highness, The Duchess of Gloucester

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I would like to take the opportunity to thank each and every one of you for your continued support of The Arts Society.

Local Societies across the UK, and the central charity, are working tirelessly to provide you with high-quality arts content, opportunities to socialise online and ways to keep you engaged with the arts remotely.

This could not have been achieved without your support; your continued involvement with your local Arts Society is more important than ever during these challenging times.

When the time comes, I know the Societies are looking forward to welcoming you again warmly in person. In the meantime, I hope you continue to enjoy the online programme, and please accept my very best wishes for 2021.

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RISING STAR

BRUSSELS PARTNERSHIP The Arts Society Brussels has announced its first cultural partner – the living museum of Foundation Frison Horta. The building, on Rue Lebeau in Brussels, was the work of the great Art Nouveau architect Victor Horta (1861–1947), for the lawyer Maurice Frison.

Now restored, it is full of his signature sinuous designs, all drawn from nature. Horta created several Art Nouveau buildings in the city, including his home, now the Horta Museum (hortamuseum.be) and the Hôtel Solvay, pictured here. Built in 1894, the building now housing the foundation is the home and venture of India-born curator Nupur Tron, who stages exhibitions with a focus on the art and culture of the East. For more, see www.foundation-frison-horta.be

This is a detail from a work by young artist Marina Renee-Cemmick (marinareneecemmick. com), whose career is followed by The Arts Society Dorset County.

Alerted to her talent by her teacher at school, the Society granted her a bursary at A-level stage.

Having graduated from The Glasgow School of Art before moving on to study for a master’s at the Royal Drawing School, London, Marina has been granted a second bursary of £500.

‘I am so grateful for this support,’ she says. ‘The money has enabled me to buy essential art materials throughout the year.’

Societies News, 1

FYLDE CREATES A WINDOW

‘In Blackpool alone,’ reports The Arts Society Fylde, ‘there are more than 16,000 people who provide unpaid care to another person.’ During 2020 lockdowns, Society Member Tony Tackett liaised with the Blackpool Carers Centre to organise an exhibition of artworks (including this, pictured) by such people.

Carers were invited to submit a small artwork defining the emotions and feelings of being a carer. Originally to have been displayed in an open exhibition, Carers HeArt, but thwarted by Covid-19 restrictions, the exhibition has instead been made available on The Arts Society Fylde’s website: bit.ly/blackpoolcarers

IN BRIEF The Arts Society Wessex is working on ‘Sculptural Park Digital Takeover!’

– a project for students working with The Roche Court Educational Trust at the New Art Centre. Participants will create content in response to art at the centre, which will then be shared on social media. _

A new craft project has been instigated

by The Arts Society Saffron Walden to help fill the gap created by restrictions on face-to-face activities in local care homes. At the end of 2020, homes received a box from the Society that was filled with materials for creating craft. _

Congratulations to The Arts Society Haslemere, recipient of an award from the national Community Rail Awards 2020, for its work in enhancing Haslemere station with artworks by local schoolchildren. _

The Arts Society is growing! The Arts Society Guernsey launched in 2020 with an inaugural lecture in September; a committee is being formed to help establish a new evening Society in Leeds; and The Arts Society Coventry hopes to stage its inaugural lecture this year.

COMBINING FORCES

The first live Members’ lecture post the first lockdown last year was a combined initiative. The Arts Societies of Chichester, City of Chichester and Lavant Valley held their lecture, hosted by Chichester Festival Theatre, in October – the first time that the Societies had worked together on such a scale. The talk was by Arts Society Lecturer Simon Seligman on Debo Mitford – housewife and more. Pictured, from left, are Jillie Moss, Area Chairman, Florian Schweizer, Chief Executive of The Arts Society, Susie Jardine, Chichester Chairman, Ian Farman, Lavant Valley Chairman, Simon Seligman and Betty Smith, City of Chichester Chairman.

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YOUR SOCIETIES

Societies news and messages from our Patron and Chair

ART

CRISTIAN BARNETT

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A CAMBRIDGE LISTING PRODUCTION CLIENT

In our winter issue 2019 we featured the vital work done by Heritage Volunteers from two Cambridge Arts Societies at the extraordinary one-time home of David Parr, a Victorian decorative artist. Now

Pat Robinson at The Arts Society Cambridge reports that the house has received Grade II* listed status and, in this time of pandemic, created access to interactive live tours. To book, go to

davidparrhouse.org

OUR UNSUNG HERO Thank you again for all the nominations sent in for your Arts Society unsung heroes. Linda Green, Chair of The Arts Society Hampstead Heath, has nominated Member Jo Velleman (left), who is also a Member of The Arts Society North London. ‘Jo has been creating and mailing out a weekly no-cost newsletter, which has been going to over 1,000 people since the start of the first lockdown,’ she says. ‘It’s a compendious list of online events, seminars, lectures, music, gallery visits and more, which must involve hours of research.

‘This has been invaluable to both our Society and the wider community around the world, especially to those who are on their own and reliant on media to relieve the tedium of our locked-down times.’

Look out for more unsung heroes at theartssociety.org

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Born in 1590, the daughter of the Earl of Cumberland, Lady Anne Clifford famously fought a 40-year battle to inherit her father’s estates. Two marriages made her Countess of Dorset and of Pembroke; widowed for a second time she returned to her homeland of Westmorland. She died in 1676 having overseen the repair and enhancement of her estates.

A formidable character, it is said she often walked the 100 miles between her five ancestral castles in Westmorland and Cumberland; today you can follow a trail called Lady Anne’s Way, which visits those sites. Now Kirkby Stephen in Cumbria has a striking new two-metre-high bronze statue of her, created by award-winning sculptor and Applebyin-Westmorland Arts Society Member Diane Lawrenson. The work captures Lady Anne’s spirit and, says Diane, her ‘steely determination’ as she walked through old Westmorland.

LOCKDOWN ART Thank you to all Members who have been in touch to share artworks created during Covid-19. Featured here is a detail from Locked In – a quilt by Heather Cawthorn of The Arts Society High Wycombe. Created in evenings over seven months, she explains that it reveals the ‘aspects of life affected at this time: memories of family in Australia locked down there; escapes into gardening, the importance of friends and neighbours, birdsong, peace and quiet, online deliveries and the NHS… and all the time reducing the risk of contracting the virus and staying safe.’

COURTESY OF FRED RATTRAY

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Societies News, 2

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IMAGE COURTESY OF KOESTLER ARTS

SUPPORTING ART IN PRISONS The Arts Society Cavendish has embarked on a three-year project with prison arts charity Koestler Arts, sponsoring its art initiatives with prisoners in Derbyshire. The charity encourages prisoners to find a positive direction through creating art (koestlerarts.org.uk).

Each year there is an exhibition of prisoners’ works (such as this, pictured) at the Southbank Centre, London. The Koestler Awards celebrate categories from emerging talent to outstanding work. This public recognition, accompanied by funds to further individual skills, helps to develop a sense of purpose. Says the Society’s Clare Allerton: ‘We are privileged to have this opportunity to support, in a small way, the Koestler Arts initiative.’

The Society is also supporting awards for budding artists at the University of Derby School of Arts, and lending support to the Buxton International Festival.

Share your news! The deadline for our next issue is 9 April. Send to magazine@theartssociety.org.

Only a selection can be featured and the editor reserves the right to edit content.

pring! A time for renewals, but repeated optimism, renewal lockdowns and an and growth. This inability to meet together year, like no other in our could compromise our collective memory, we overall membership. burn for the green shoots I have been evangelical of a post-Covid world. As about supporting my is often the case in crisis chosen charities during times, a golden age will the pandemic. I have not surely follow, including made as much use of my for the arts. Creativity is memberships as normal, FROM OUR CHAIR but know that with stimulated by reflection, plumbing previously revenues reduced my OF TRUSTEES unexplored or forgotten support is needed more Julie Goldsmith emotional depths and than ever. responding to the world or Revenue from our self in new ways. An example is the commercial income streams has been work of poet TS Eliot. When studying hugely reduced – these sources heavily his poetry as a teenager I didn’t know his subsidise the cost of serving our 380 greatest works were fuelled by his own Societies. This year and probably next, experience of the Spanish flu. Could he they are denied us. To mitigate this, the have plumbed such emotional depths Trustees, working with the senior if he had not been afflicted by that virus? management team, have taken actions to It changed his perspective on life, and cushion the effect of Covid. Many of our the canon of English literature is the team at Guilford Street are now subject richer for it. to an indefinite pay freeze. Costs have We have all been deeply affected by been cut. Savings have been passed back events of the past 12 months, but have to Societies. An already lean organisation demonstrated grit and determination in has responded as it should, but there getting on with our lives, seeking out the is only so far we can go without positive and learning new skills. Our compromising the quality of what we do perspective has inevitably changed. Our for you and our aim to play – through our Members are embracing a digital world Societies – a part in the recovery of the that enables us to stay connected, be arts. Our plans for membership growth in sociable and enjoy the riches that The 2020 were scuppered, as were plans for Arts Society affords us. The creativity seeking external funding from trusts and of local Society Committees and our foundations for additional content. While team at Guilford Street has helped us. we can resurrect our plans in the future, It has also increased possibilities, we anticipate the demand from external bringing different ways of experiencing funding sources will be focused on arts talks, and new formats, platforms and organisations that are on their knees. appreciative audiences, who perhaps We appeal to you for your continued didn’t know us before. support. Enjoy and share our talks and It might not be clear to us now, but we content and camaraderie. Extol the have in place the ingredients for a bright virtues of what we do and please renew future, despite immediate challenges. your membership. This is the strangest The threat inherent in those challenges of times, but perhaps for the first time in is a concern for Trustees and Society a long while, we are very much in touch Committees. There is a risk that many with what it is we value from our Arts of you choose not to continue your Society, individually and collectively. That membership or support of charities, is the best starting point for regeneration. including The Arts Society. We have The shot in the arm we have been waiting seen only a small decline in membership for perhaps?

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SPECIAL OFFERS

BENEFITS, DISCOUNTS AND TREATS FOR MEMBERS AND SUPPORTERS OF THE ARTS SOCIETY REPRO OP

WIN SPECIAL DISCOUNT

A BOOK FOR SPRING SUBS ART PRODUCTION

Flower: Exploring the World in Bloom celebrates flowers throughout history.

Published by Phaidon (phaidon.com), this book brings together a variety of styles and media, from paintings and jewellery to botanical illustrations and sculpture. It features artists including David Hockney, Azuma Makoto and Georgia O’Keeffe. For a chance to win one of three copies, email your name and address to magazine@theartssociety.org with ‘Flower’ as the subject, or send a postcard marked ‘Flower’ to The Arts Society Magazine, Think, Capital House, 25 Chapel Street, London NW1 5DH by 30 April 2021.

CLIENT

20% DISCOUNT

A DAY AT THE SCULPTURE PARK Set within 10 acres of arboretum and water gardens, The Sculpture Park near Farnham, Surrey, is the world’s largest all-year sculpture exhibition with 650-plus sculptures. Members of The Arts Society can enjoy a 20% discount on the entry price when they book tickets via the website thesculpturepark.com.

Members will then be taken to the Eventbrite booking page where they can enter the code ‘ARTS21’ at the online checkout. The discount is valid until 31 July 2021.

THE WALLACE COLLECTION’S ONLINE SHOP From porcelain created by the Sèvres manufactory to artworks by Titian, Rubens and Van Dyck, The Wallace Collection is home to one of the world’s most significant collections of fine and decorative art. Its upcoming exhibition, Rubens: Reuniting the Great Landscapes (21 April–15 August 2021), brings together two of the artist’s acclaimed paintings of the Brabant countryside. We have teamed up with The Wallace Collection to offer a 10% discount on items from its online shop, including books, prints, canvases and a range of gifts inspired by the collection. These include an exclusive bone china tea set designed by Melody Rose and inspired by the 18th-century Rococo painter François Boucher.

To claim, enter the code ‘ARTSOCIETY10’ at the online checkout at wallacecollectionshop.org. The offer is valid until 31 March 2021.

10% OFF

FLOWERS DELIVERED DIRECT From hand-tied bouquets to letterbox flowers, the familyowned business Bunches delivers a range of beautiful blooms to your door. They are offering Members a 10% discount on all orders until October 2021. To claim, enter the code ‘ARTS10’ at the checkout at bunches.co.uk. Please note that the offer is not valid on subscription gifts, experience day gifts or Flowers for a Year.

For our monthly special offers online, see theartssociety.org/member-offers Subscribers to our mailing list are notified through our monthly e-newsletter: sign up at theartssociety.org/signup 5 6 / T HE A RTSS O C IETY.O RG

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F O R YO U

Books, 1

BOOKS VERSION

GOOD READS

Our pick of the season’s latest arts and culture titles

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BRIDGET RILEY: THE COMPLETE PRINTS 1962–2020 SUBS

Foreword by Bridget Riley; essays by Craig Hartley, Lynn MacRitchie and Robert Kudielka; catalogue raisonné by Alexandra Tommasini and Rosa Gubay (Thames & Hudson/The Bridget Riley Art Foundation, £45)

ART CLIENT

COURTESY STÄDTISCHE GALERIE, VILLINGEN-SCHWENNINGEN. PHOTO HORST W KURSCHAT

PRODUCTION

Art to carry us into spring, this new publication on artist Bridget Riley’s printmaking provides a powerful antidote to our gloomy winter past.

Now in her 90th year, Riley’s fame is based on her mastery of Op art – the medium that uses anamorphosis (visual distortion) to dazzling effect.

In Riley’s hands the results are artworks that are poetic, controlled and joyous. Throughout her career, in addition to her painting, she has made prints – an area of her work not always taken as a focus. This book is a completely up-to-date catalogue raisonné of her graphic work over almost 60 years, featuring some 100 works.

Making prints, says Riley ‘has been a very valuable addition to my working life as a painter, allowing me to extend particular trains of thought’. The works featured reflect her development as a painter, revealing how she has explored compositions as she builds on ideas for a painted work.

Through the medium of printmaking – almost all executed by silk screen – she has also interrogated colour relationships to exacting effect. The essays provide context to Riley’s career. They lift the lid, too, on the processes and partnerships followed in creating such quality artist prints, while that of artist and writer Lynn MacRitchie notes how: ‘Riley described her first print of 1962 as the work of “a very naive printmaker”, adding mischievously that she had managed to remain one.’

As MacRitchie adds: ‘She never was one, of course.

She grasped the particular requirements of printmaking from the first… to create some of the most innovative and technically accomplished screen prints ever made, Bridget Riley demonstrating the movement fitting companions to her in After Rajasthan (2013) at the opening of Bridget Riley – Prints, Städtische Galerie, 2013 great paintings…’

Art Nouveau Architecture Dr Anne Anderson (Crowood, £24) Art Nouveau, with its organic shapes and new vocabulary of architectural forms, cast its tendrils over Europe at the end of the 19th century and on, into the first decade of the 20th.

Arts Society Lecturer Dr Anne Anderson has studied the subject for over 30 years. Now comes her authoritative, beautifully illustrated book on the movement. She explores how it came into being, what made it so unique and who the key players associated with it were.

‘A Marvel to Behold’: Gold and Silver at the Court of Henry VIII Timothy Schroder (Boydell & Brewer, £45) A visit to an exhibition led Arts Society Lecturer Timothy Schroder to discover what is possibly the only surviving piece of goldsmiths’ work made in England for Henry VIII. Displays of plate, gold and silver played a key role in underlining the monarch’s magnificence; huge sums were spent on it.

Those treasures are now all but gone, but here Schroder shines a light on this lost collection.

Chrysanthemum Twigs Way (Reaktion Books, £16) Tissot grew them in his London conservatory; Monet and Renoir painted them; they feature in ancient Chinese works; and the Japanese cultivated them with pride… here comes a perfect (and vibrantly illustrated) book for the season: one that takes as its focus the chrysanthemum. Horticultural expert and Arts Society Lecturer Twigs Way deftly explores why this flower has signified both life and death, and how it has found its way into philosophy and literature, as well as art.

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BEAUTIFUL ICE-CREAM VANS I’m of Punjabi heritage and was born in Liverpool. When my father came to Merseyside from India in the 1950s he couldn’t find work, so bought an ice-cream van. It was deep, fun, tough stuff being the daughter of an ice-cream man.

I cleaned the van every night and Mum counted the earnings on the living room floor. But I love these vans.

In the pandemic they’ve been in limbo; some local authorities ordered them not to chime.

But ice-cream vans bring communities together. They have an iconic quality.

It was lovely to see kids jumping for joy over the neon van I included in the installation.

PRODUCTION CLIENT

THE ART THAT MADE ME Artist Dr Chila Kumari Singh Burman lit up Tate Britain’s facade in the dark nights of the second lockdown with her installation, remembering a brave new world.

Here she reveals the art forms that have had a special impact on her

THE WONDER OF MAGIC My dad, who was actually a tailor, was a self-taught magician. He ‘ate’ fire, light bulbs and razor blades. He did magic tricks on stage in Liverpool to entertain seamen from the port and the workingclass Punjabi community.

He never revealed his tricks, but his show was a feast of light and fire and definitely led to the magic of my Tate installation.

PERFECTLY PUNK I went to Leeds Polytechnic in the 1970s and our refectory had punk bands five times a week for free. My vinyl collection still holds LPs by artists like the Sex Pistols and The Clash.

I loved the anarchic, anti-establishment feminist politics of that time and the fashion, music and performance that went with it. To me it was high art meets popular culture meets Dada. Punk art equals photocopy art equals sex and drugs and rock and roll.

FIND OUT MORE I’m thinking of the music made by figures such as Rita Marley, Judy Mowatt, Marcia Griffiths and Sly and Robbie. I’ve mixed reggae, bhangra and Bollywood for my films and love to dance to it in my living room.

• Dr Chila Kumari Singh Burman’s art is held in a number of collections, including the V&A Museum and the Wellcome Trust • Discover more at chila-kumariburman.co.uk

ALL IMAGES © TATE (JOE HUMPHRYS)

A LITTLE BIT OF REGGAE I have a collection of vinyl reggae from the 1970s, from rock to heavy dub. This is consciously political music. It’s also dance music – spiritually healing and uplifting.

SUSANNE DIETZ

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THE BLACKPOOL ILLUMINATIONS These were the neon-light colour experience of my childhood – one long, endless drive of blazing, innocent visuals.

We would take relatives from India to see them every year.

The neons for my Tate Britain facade all come from those childhood memories; they had a huge impact on me. And Blackpool had the best chippies in the world.

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BLACK YELLOW MAGENTA CYAN

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The Art That Made Me, 1

INFLUENCES