Programme Membership year 2023/24 The lecture programme is subject to change so keep checking back to the website for the latest information about lectures. The meetings start at 7.30pm. First lecture of the new membership year 2024/25 23rd October 24 Peter Swallow Bentwood and plywood furniture. Its design and creation Plywood can trace it origins back to Ancient Egypt where thin, hand sawn slices of timber were used to build up decorative panels. The widespread is of plywood began in C19th with advances in manufacturing technology to produce large stable boards. Following a brief introduction to furniture prior to 1800 and and overview of the many uses of plywood the talk will concentrate on the design and manufacture of plywood chairs. Frame of curving linear bent beechwood elements; the arms flow into two long parallel runners; caned, oval back joined to elongated oval bent wood element, in turn joined to caned seat supported on the runners by four intertwined circular bentwood form; two curving bentwood supports join lower back to runners. Unknown artist. Public domain 27th November Paul Rabbitts Concise History of Public Parks This really is a fascinating insight into the history of one of our greatest ever institutions - our Great British Public Park. We have all enjoyed them at some time in our lives but what do we really know about them? What are their origins? This talk illustrates their origins from the great Royal Parks to the Pleasure Gardens of the eighteenth century, to their Victorian heyday. It discusses what makes a great park, it’s ‘parkitecture’ with examples of lodges, lakes, bandstands, fountains, lidos, palm houses and to their wonderful floral displays, to their great decline in the sixties, seventies and eighties. Bandstand at Priory Park (Great Malvern) Photo: Fabian Musto. C reative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 22nd January 2025 Astrid Bolodis Gustavs Klucis: Lenin’s poster boy, careerist or enemy of the state? Gustavs Klucis was born in a region of the Russian Empire that would become the independent Republic of Latvia. His life and practice followed the trajectory of the Bolshevik Revolution, the death of Lenin, the eventual acknowledgment of Joseph Stalin as leader of the Soviet Union, and ended during the Great Terror. The talk will illustrate how his work and ambition was influenced by other artists, and adapted in response to the politics and economics of his time. Gustavs Klucis - Construction. Public domain 26th February 2025 Barry Venning Cartoons and Contraptions: the Wonderful World of W. Heath Robinson For over a century, W. Heath Robinson, whom the novelist, Philip Pullman called ‘the immortal contraptioneer’, has been famous for drawing rickety, bizarrely complicated devices that carry out the simplest of tasks like potato peeling, wart removal or pancake making. He became so famous for them that in 1933, he was the obvious person to illustrate Norman Hunter’s Professor Branestawm books and, in 1943, Bletchley Park named one of their code-breaking machines after him. Much later still, some of the contraptions in Wallace and Gromit’s The Wrong Trousers are based on a scale model of a gadget filled house that he made for the Ideal Home Show in 1934. Inventions - How to Avoid Tears when Peeling Onions. William Heath Robinson. Public domain 26th March 2025 Joanna Banham A Passion for Pattern : Victorian Wallpapers The Victorian period witnessed massive increases in the production of wallpaper when a product that had previously been a luxury item became a commodity that was available to all but the very poorest of homes. It was also a time that saw a huge proliferation of different styles ranging from glamorous hand-printed French floral patterns, to the geometric designs of the Gothic Revival, to the innovative work of Morris and the Arts and Crafts Movement. This lecture also discusses innovative features such as nursery designs and relief decorations like Lincrusta Walton and Anaglypta, and the many different ways that wallpaper was used in the decoration of the Victorian home. Drawing, An Interior, 1837–40. The boldly patterned wallpaper, green draperies and matching upholstered furniture shown in this interior impart an air of masculinity to the room. Photo: Mary Ellen Best. Public domain 23rd April 2025 Raymond Warburton Sculpture in Britain Today and Tomorrow British sculpture enjoyed a renaissance in the 20th century, with the likes of Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, Anthony Caro and Elizabeth Frink leading the way. But who came afterwards and with what effect? Among the new generation of British-based sculptors were Rachel Whiteread, Antony Gormley, Maggi Hambling, Anish Kapoor, Richard Long and David Nash. These days all six are world-renowned and are still working as hard as ever. Each in their own way is innovative, inspirational and deeply human. They have produced sculptures that are glorious, challenging and moving in equal measure. Anish Kapoor / Istanbul. Nevit Dilmen. Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 21st May 2025 Charlie Hall Peggy Guggenheim - A Life of Collecting Describing herself by writing, "I am a museum", Peggy Guggenheim's life took a clear path, from setting up a commercial gallery in London, going on a single-minded shopping trip to Paris in the late 1930's even as the German tanks were rolling in to the suburbs, to escape (with her selection of European artists) to New York. There the subsequent establishment of her museum (and Arts centre), and finally the purchase of the eccentric 'unfinished palazzo' in Venice, her collection remains one of the most iconic assemblages of Twentieth Century art in the world. Peggy Guggenheim Museum Venice. "Angel of the City". Photo: David Pirmann. Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 25th June 2025 Antonia Gatward Cevizli Snuff-boxes Salons and Studios: Women Artists in the 18th and 19th Centuries In 1971 Linda Nochlin wrote her famous essay “Why have there been no great women artists?” Since then, much has been done to insert women into the canon and uncover their lives and works. 24th September 2025 Ashley Gray Post War Textile Visionaries of Modern Art: Alistair Morton & Edinburgh Weavers Alistair Morton, a modernist visionary, was uniquely recognised for his talent of interpreting in fabric the full quality of an artist’s handwriting. He commissioned drawings from some of the greatest modern artists for textile production and through his designer's eye took their art to new levels. In the late 1930s his Constructivist range saw work from Ben Nicholson and Barbara Hepworth translated into jacquard woven textiles for the top end of British Interior design. In the post war era, Morton continued to fuse modern art with textile design, keeping it in step with contemporary living. This is the last lecture of the 2024/2025 Membership year.