Venue: The Trinity Arts Centre, Gainsborough
LECTURES
1.45 pm, first Thursday of the month - February to June and September to December
Note: no meetings in January, July and August
2024
Summary of lectures for 2024 - for fuller details see below
February 1 - Simon Whitehouse - Wilde about Oscar: famous for being famous & (IN)famous
March 7 - Lydia Bauman - Looking for Georgia - my travels in Mexico in the footsteps of Georgia O'Keeffe
April 4 - Tim Stimson - Sun and Snow - Nordic Landscape Painting
May 2 - Pamela Campbell-Johnston - From Claridge's Hotel to the London Underground: the life and work of textile designer, Marion Dorn
June 6 - Barry Venning - Art after Windrush: Post-Colonial Artists in Britain since 1948
September 5 - Caroline Walker - The Gill Brothers
October 3 - Brian Stater - World-Famous Photographs: Images that shaped our culture
November 7 - Paula Nuttall - David: from Donatello to Michelangelo
December 5 - Peter Medhurst - Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht: the story of the world-renowned carol
December 5, 2024 
Peter Medhurst
Peter appears in the UK and abroad as a musician and scholar, giving recitals and delivering illustrated lectures on music and the arts. He studied singing and early keyboard instruments at the Royal College of Music and at the Mozarteum in Salzburg.
Lecture Title
Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht: the story of the world-renowned carol
2025
February 6 - Monica Bohm-Ducheni - Visions of the Orient: Japanese Art and the Western Artistic Imagination
March 6 - Rupert Willoughby - Threads of History: the world of the Bayeux Tapestry
April 3 - Julia Musgrave - Vincent van Gogh: London, Paris and Japan
May 1 - David Winpenny - Up to a Point: Pyramids of UK and Ireland
June 5 - Anna Moszynska - Art of the 21st Century
September 4 - Pauline Chakmakjian - Japanese Cuisine
October 2 - Jo Walton - More than meets the eye: Artists and Camouflage
November 6 - Paul Bahn - New Advances in Ice Age Art
December 4 - Patrick Craig - Entertaining Angels Unawares: Angels in the Bible, Music and Art
February 6, 2025
Monica Bohm-Ducheni
London-based freelance lecturer, writer and exhibition organiser. Has lectured for Tate, the National Gallery, the Royal Academy of Arts, the Open University, Sotheby's Institute of Art and the Courtauld Institute of Art. Associate Lecturer at Birkbeck College since 2005, and has led many tours. Publications include Understanding Modern Art (1991), Chagall (1998/2001), The Private Life of a Masterpiece (2001),The Art and Life of Josef Herman (2009) and Art and the Second World War (2013). She is the initiator and Creative Director of the nationwide Insiders/Outsiders arts festival (see https://insidersoutsidersfestival.org/), and contributing editor of the companion volume, Insiders/Outsiders: Refugees from Nazi Europe and their Contribution to British Visual Culture (2019).
Visions of the Orient: Japanese Art and the Western Artistic Imagination
For over two hundred years, until 1853, Japan had been almost entirely cut off from the western world. But almost immediately after trade routes re-opened, Japanese art and artifacts – as evidenced by countless portraits of beautiful women sporting kimonos and fans, with a backdrop of splendid porcelain vases - became all the rage in the West. But there was another, more profound and long-lasting, influence at work: namely that of the decorative, non-naturalistic woodcut prints by masters of the ukiyo-e (‘floating world’) school, which – combined with the influence of the new medium of photography – opened avant-garde artists’ eyes to entirely different ways of representing the world. The artists to be discussed in this lecture include household names like Claude Monet, Vincent van Gogh, Edgar Degas, Mary Cassatt and James McNeill Whistler, but also lesser-known figures such as Odilon Redon and James Tissot, as well as now barely-remembered artists such as Giuseppe de Nittis and John Frederick Lewis.
March 6, 2025
Rupert Willoughby
Rupert Willoughby is an historian and Classicist, a poet, a father and a committed outdoor
swimmer with a passion for castles, lakes and uncovering the layers of the past. A graduate with First Class Honours in History from the University of London (where he immersed himself in the ‘Byzantine’, or medieval Greek Empire), he is the author of the best-selling Life in Medieval England for Pitkin, and of a series of popular histories of places, including Chawton: Jane Austen’s Village, and the whimsical, yet scholarly Basingstoke and its Contribution to World Culture. Rupert also contributes regular obituaries to The Daily Telegraph. Accredited by The Arts Society since 2011, he is an experienced lecturer, who is known for his light, humorous touch, his love of narrative and his vivid evocations of the past. Rupert’s forefathers were Vikings and his foremothers were Tatars.
Threads of History: the world of the Bayeux Tapestry
In this lively introduction to the tapestry – so much more than the story of Hastings – Rupert unravels some of its mysteries, places it in the context of its age and firmly establishes it as a landmark in the history of Western art. Commissioned by the Bishop of Bayeux who fought at Hastings, executed by skilled English craftsmen, the Bayeux Tapestry is the last survivor of a vanished art form. Rupert Willoughby presents a lively introduction to the tapestry – so much more than the story of Hastings – in which he unravels some of its mysteries, places it in the context of its age and firmly establishes it as a landmark in the history of Western art. With its lively illustrations of languid, party-loving, moustachioed Englishmen, of the cavalcades of noble huntsmen and of the snorting Norman cavalry poised to charge into battle, the Tapestry is the next best thing to a moving picture from the time.
April 3, 2025
Julia Musgrave
Julia Musgrave got her first degree in Chemical Engineering and went on to become a Chartered 
Information Systems Engineer and IT project manager. In 2008 she decided that life was too short for just one career and decided to become an art historian. She now has a Graduate Diploma in the History of Art from the Courtauld Institute of Art and an MLitt in ‘Art, Style and Design: Renaissance to Modernism, c.1450 – c.1930’ from the University of Glasgow. She gained her PhD at the University of York for her research into the involvement of Roger Fry and the Bloomsbury Group and the social networks of the British art world in the development of the Contemporary Art Society from 1910 to 1939. She teaches Art History at the City Literary Institute (City Lit) and is Co-Director of The London Art Salon.
Vincent van Gogh: London, Paris and Japan
Vincent van Gogh’s life as an artist spanned an all-too-short ten years – the art that inspired him in London and Paris was not just that of his contemporaries but also Old Masters and the newly imported works by Japanese printmakers. An art world of galleries, magazines, a network of friendships and even a shop are at the root of Vincent van Gogh’s ideas – but how did they come together in London and Paris? In this lecture I follow Vincent to London and then to Paris, looking at how the people he met and the art he saw, and collected, influenced his work.
May 1, 2025
David Winpenny
Studied English at Birmingham University and taught for several years before joining the Countryside 
Commission as Co-ordinator of its National Parks Campaign. Worked for the Central Office of Information in Leeds before setting up own public relations company. Author of 'Up to a Point - in search of pyramids in Britain and Ireland' and has written and contributed to several books for the AA. Has written for BBC Countryfile Magazine and English Heritage magazine. He is chairman of Ripon Civic Society and lectures on architectural and related subjects on cruise ships and on dry land.
Up to a Point: Pyramids of UK and Ireland
From Inverness to Cornwall, from Pembrokeshire to Norfolk, from the Antrim Coast to County Cork, the pyramids of Britain and Ireland are little-known but of great variety and interest. This talk, which will include local examples, sets the pyramids of Britain and Ireland in their historical perspective and tells the story of the mausoleums, memorials, garden ornaments, pumps, wellheads, boat houses, beacons, sculptures, churches, offices, shops, sports halls, swimming pools, cinemas, navigation marks and general pyramidal oddities that turn up in the most unexpected places.
June 5, 2025
Anna Moszynska
I am a London-based lecturer and writer specialising in contemporary art. During the 1990s, I oversaw the development of the subject as the first Master’s Degree at Sotheby’s Institute. I have also taught at other institutions in London including The City Lit, the Royal Academy and Tate, as well as lecturing in cities ranging from Dubai to New York and Berlin to Sydney. I continue to offer guest lectures on the Sotheby’s Institute MA in Contemporary Art. Apart from the many catalogue essays I have written on living artists, my books include Abstract Art (1990, enlarged ed. 2020) and Sculpture Now (2013), both published by Thames & Hudson, and two books on the drawings of Antony Gormley. I enjoy introducing art to audiences in a lively and approachable way to make modern and contemporary art both accessible and interesting.
Art of the 21st Century
From Inverness to Cornwall, from Pembrokeshire to Norfolk, from the Antrim Coast to County Cork, the pyramids of Britain and Ireland are little-known but of great variety and interest. This talk, which will include local examples, sets the pyramids of Britain and Ireland in their historical perspective and tells the story of the mausoleums, memorials, garden ornaments, pumps, wellheads, boat houses, beacons, sculptures, churches, offices, shops, sports halls, swimming pools, cinemas, navigation marks and general pyramidal oddities that turn up in the most unexpected places.
September 4, 2025
Pauline Chakmakjian 
Pauline Chakmakjian is a lecturer on a variety of subjects related to the history, fine arts and culture of Japan as well as unusual topics such as Freemasonry. An Arts Society lecturer since 2011, she has also completed lecture tours for ADFAS in Australia (Cook, 2013 and Hume, 2016) as well as New Zealand DFAS (2014). She holds a BA in English Literature during which she was also awarded a Merit Scholarship in Fine Art (drawing and painting), a Diploma in Law, an MA in Modern French Studies and is a member of the Honourable Society of the Inner Temple. Pauline was elected onto the Board of the Japan Society of the United Kingdom from 2008–2014 and the Japan Society of Hawaii from 2015–2017. In 2014, Pauline was appointed a Visit Kyoto Ambassador by the Mayor of the City of Kyoto and in 2018, she became a Freeman of The City of London. Pauline is also the author of a series of books, the first one of which is entitled, The Sphinxing Rabbit: Her Sovereign Majesty (Panoma Press, 2019) and the second, The Sphinxing Rabbit: Book of Hours (Panoma Press, 2021). Her new publisher has published The Sphinxing Rabbit: Her Sovereign Majesty (Markosia, 2023), then published The Sphinxing Rabbit: Book of Hours (Markosia, 2024) and finally The Sphinxing Rabbit: Clubs and Societies (Markosia, 2024) to complete her trilogy.
Japanese Cuisine
With their attention to detail according to seasons and occasions and the taking pleasure in aesthetic presentation to entertain, impress and sometimes even surprise a guest, Japanese cuisine and the presentation of Japanese food dishes could be considered works of art themselves.
October 2, 2025
Jo Walton
Has combined teaching and lecturing with a career in art bookselling and has been a volunteer guide at both Tate Britain and Tate Modern. Now a freelance lecturer for The Arts Society, The National Gallery, The Art Fund, and local art societies.
More than meets the eye: Artists and Camouflage
During the First and Second World Wars, artists became involved in designing camouflage, using new ideas about optics and perception to mislead, misdirect and deceive the enemy. In this talk we’ll consider the background to the development of camouflage and explore the ways in which artists such as Hugh Casson, Oliver Messel and Julian Trevelyan helped the war effort. From ‘dazzle camouflage’ for ships, to complex illusions that hid power stations and military installations from aircraft, this is a story of secrecy, deception and artistic derring-do, all in pursuit of the great goal – victory in war.
November 6, 2025
Paul Bahn
Studied archaeology at the University of Cambridge, and completed PhD thesis (1979) on the prehistory of the French Pyrenees. Has held post-doctoral fellowships, at Liverpool and London, plus a J. Paul Getty postdoctoral fellowship in the History of Art and the Humanities. Devotes time to writing, editing and translating books on archaeology, plus occasional journalism and as much travel as possible. Main research interest is prehistoric art, especially rock art of the world, and most notably Palaeolithic art, as well as Easter Island. Led the team which, at his instigation, searched for and discovered the first Ice Age cave art in Britain (at Creswell Crags) in 2003.
New Advances in Ice Age Art
Ice Age art - dating from c.40,000 to 12,000 years ago - continues to be found every year, in the form of both portable objects and images on cave walls and on rocks in the open air. This talk will present a selection of the most recent discoveries, many of them still unknown to the general public, and a few still unpublished. Most are in western Europe, but other regions from Florida to the Nile Valley have also entered the picture in recent years.
December 4, 2025
Patrick Craig
Patrick Craig is a Vicar Choral at St Paul’s Cathedral. For twenty years he combined this with an international career singing over a thousand concerts with the world-renowned early music consort The Tallis Scholars. He also sings with the award-winning group The Cardinall’s Musick. He founded and conducts this country’s leading all-female professional choir, Aurora Nova. He has conducted concerts for the BBC Proms, the Brighton, Lichfield and Aldeburgh Festivals, and with the City of London Sinfonia. As a Cambridge history graduate with a lifelong interest in the arts, he has gone on to lead choral workshops for amateur singers across the world, where he places music in its historical and cultural context. He regularly lectures for the St Paul’s Adult Education programme and for John Hall’s Venice Courses, which have allowed him to incorporate his interests in theology, art and poetry. In 2020, when his singing and conducting work disappeared overnight as a result of the Covid pandemic, Patrick poured all his experience into online presentations which have raised vital funds for the Help
Entertaining Angels Unawares: Angels in the Bible, Music and Art
Angels don’t speak, they sing. And they have inspired much wonderful music. Patrick will investigate their roles as guardians, messengers and fighters through imaginative music by Britten, Elgar and Mendelssohn. Angelic words also feature in regularly repeated liturgical texts that Patrick sings daily in St Paul’s Cathedral, such as the Sanctus and Te Deum. These will give us an opportunity to explore and enjoy angelic music by composers such as Bach, Mozart and Walton. Patrick will call on some of the world’s finest art and poetry to further expand this journey into the heavenly realm.
2026
February 5 - Rosalind Whyte - A Highland Thing? 18th to 20th Century Scottish Art
March 5 - Nicole Mezey - The Art of Stained Glass
April 2 - Dr John Stevens - The Art of Rabindranath Tagore
May 7 - Fiona Rose - The David Parr House: a Decorative Artist's Palace of Art
June 4 - Nirvana Romell - Mosaics in the Northern Adriatic: Power, Beauty and Education
September 3 - Dr Duncan Pring - The Mayan Civilisation of Central America
October 1 - Caroline Bendix - Why can't we read them? Conserving Books of The National Trust
November 5 - Barry Venning - Cartoons and Contraptions: The Wonderful World of W. Heath Robinson
December 3 - Dr Maureen Ille - Fowers in Art
February 5, 2026
Rosalind Whyte
BA and MA from Goldsmith’s College, and an MA (distinction) from Birkbeck College. Experienced guide at Tate Britain, Tate Modern, the Royal Academy and Greenwich. Lectures at Tate, to independent art societies and on cruises. Leads art appreciation holidays.
A Highland Thing? 18th to 20th Century Scottish Art
For many years Scottish artists found it necessary to travel south to make their names and careers in art, but with the increasing importance of the cities of Edinburgh and Glasgow from the end of the 18th Century, an independent Scottish art scene became possible. These developments will be traced through individuals such as Sir Henry Raeburn, the first artist to find success whilst remaining in his native Scotland, and Sir David Wilkie, important as one of the first to truly export Scottish art. This lecture will also look at the parallels between Scottish and other European art, as well as periods of divergence, touching on art movements such as the Glasgow Boys and the Scottish Colourists.
March 5, 2026
Nicole Mezey
Nicole studied Art History at the Universities of Sussex, York and Paris and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and of the Higher Education Academy. She was Senior Lecturer at Queen’s University, Belfast until 2009, working primarily with adults, managing and teaching on both the Part-Time degree and Extra-Mural programmes and conducting annual, international study-tours. She also established and was first Director of the Department of Art History, the first in the north of Ireland. Nicole now lives in central London and is a freelance lecturer, working for organisations such as national museums, universities, the National Trust and private companies. She has been lecturing for the Arts Society since 2011, including two tours of societies in Australia and New Zealand.
The Art of Stained Glass
The work of art is not just a symbol of creative genius but a historical object and the result of a laborious process of creation. This lecture looks at the development of stained glass, its purpose, the process by which it was created and some of the extraordinary survivals. Concentrating on great medieval achievements from vast cathedrals to tiny chapels, we consider, too, the reasons for the decline in popularity of this once-preeminent art form and some of the projects in which it has been reconsidered and revived. Where possible, all lectures are tailored to include relevant local examples.
April 2, 2026
Dr John Stevens
Dr John Stevens gained his PhD in History from UCL, before going on to teach British Imperial History, Indian History and Bengali Language at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS, University of London). His biography of the Indian guru Keshab Chandra Sen – Keshab: Bengal’s Forgotten Prophet - was published by Hurst and Oxford University Press in 2018. He is a regular visitor to India and Bangladesh and has lectured at numerous Indian universities. He also works as a consultant on Indian affairs and teaches the Bengali language to private students. He has appeared many times in the Indian media, and was a guest on BBC Radio Four’s In Our Time, discussing the poet and artist Rabindranath Tagore.
The Art of Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) is arguably the most important Indian artistic figure of the modern era. The first Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, claimed that he had two gurus: Gandhi and Tagore. A renowned poet, novelist, composer and painter, Tagore is also the only person in history to have written the national anthems for three countries (India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh). He became a global sensation when he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, the first non-European to do so. This lecture provides an introduction to Tagore’s remarkable life and work, including his novels, poetry, songs and paintings.
May 7, 2026
Fiona Rose
Fiona Rose has been lecturing about topics she feels passionately about since 2010 including William Morris and his circle, the Arts & Crafts Movement, Frida Kahlo and Frank Lloyd Wright. She has a BA in Social Psychology and aims to include the human story behind the artistic endeavours of her subjects. After an early career in public health Fiona founded and runs a home interiors business featuring the work of the great C19th designers such as Morris, Dearle, Voysey and Mackintosh. Fiona is a member of the Museum Collections committee for The William Morris Society and a former Trustee serving as Chair of their Communications and Business Development committees. She is also a regular contributor to the Society’s Magazine and a book reviewer for the Journal of William Morris Studies. Fiona is a House Guide and specialist lecturer for the David Parr House in Cambridge.
The David Parr House: a Decorative Artist's Palace of Art
Behind the front door of a modest terraced house in Cambridge lies an extraordinary Victorian hand painted interior. Working class decorative artist David Parr (1854-1927) spent many years decorating the finest churches and grandest homes in the country. In his precious spare time, he painted the walls of his own home with designs inspired by those he had worked on professionally, adapting them to create his own palace of art at 186 Gwydir Street.
June 4, 2026
Nirvana Romell
Ravenna is well known for its mesmerising mosaics. However, the Northern Adriatic coast has two more World Heritage Sites, and many smaller places showcasing incredible mosaics. For centuries, Aquileia hid the largest early Christian mosaic in Europe, used to explain the basics of the new religion to neophytes. In Poreč mosaics, a Byzantine Madonna triumphantly sits on the throne above the altar – perhaps for the first times in the history of Christianity. These mosaics have great aesthetic beauty and story-telling powers. They also bear witness to the centuries of people and culture mixing, and power struggles in the first Christian millennium.
Mosaics in the Northern Adriatic: Power, Beauty and Education
Ravenna is well known for its mesmerising mosaics. However, the Northern Adriatic coast has two more World Heritage Sites, and many smaller places showcasing incredible mosaics. For centuries, Aquileia hid the largest early Christian mosaic in Europe, used to explain the basics of the new religion to neophytes. In Poreč mosaics, a Byzantine Madonna triumphantly sits on the throne above the altar – perhaps for the first times in the history of Christianity. These mosaics have great aesthetic beauty and story-telling powers. They also bear witness to the centuries of people and culture mixing, and power struggles in the first Christian millennium.
September 3, 2026
Dr Duncan Pring
Educated at Oxford (BA, MA) and London (MA, Ph.D) universities. PhD thesis on “The Preclassic Ceramics of Northern Belize”. Subsequent articles, mainly on Mayan ceramics. The Protoclassic in the Maya Lowlands published in 2000 by British Archaeological Reports. Recent publication on Early Maya Ceramics in "Pre-Mamom Pottery Variation and the Preclassic Origins of the Lowland Maya" ( Ed. Debra Walker University Press of Colorado 2023).
The Mayan Civilisation of Central America
The Maya lived in Central America between 1000 B.C. and 1528 at which time they were conquered by the Spaniards. The peak of their civilization was between 300 and 900 AD. During that time, they built enormous monuments, produced jade and ceramic items of great beauty and developed a calendar that was far more advanced than anything in Europe at the time. They had an advanced understanding of mathematics and astronomy and developed a hieroglyphic script which scholars are beginning to decipher, allowing us to understand their achievements much more fully.
October 1, 2026
Caroline Bendix
Caroline Bendix is a library conservator, accredited through the Institute of Conservation, who has worked on over 500 collections in the UK and abroad, including St Catherine’s Monastery, Sinai, advising on all aspects of books’ care in situ. She has written three of the British Library’s guides on preservation and in 2019 was awarded the Plowden Medal for her “outstanding work in developing in-situ library conservation”. Since 1992 she has been the National Trust’s Adviser on Libraries Conservation, the adviser and trainer for The Arts Society’s Heritage Volunteers projects and is on the Archbishop of Canterbury’s advisory panel for Lambeth Palace Library.
Why can't we read them? Conserving Books of The National Trust
The National Trust’s collection of some 450,000 books in 205 locations is cared for by property staff, volunteers and freelance conservators, working together to maintain the libraries in good working condition. Managing the environment, tracking down pests, creating conservation techniques that are discreet, and stabilising the collections for use are the main elements. Conservation evolves as the books’ use evolves, e.g. the catalogue is now available on-line and more researchers require access. The increased wish to use the books for visitor engagement projects provides further challenges.
November 5, 2026
Barry Venning
Barry Venning is an art historian whose interests and teaching range from the art of late medieval Europe to global contemporary art. He has published books, articles and exhibition catalogue essays on Turner, Constable and European landscape painting, but also has an ongoing research interest in postcolonial art and British visual satire. He works as a consultant and associate lecturer for the Open University. His media work includes two BBC TV documentaries, radio appearances for BBC local radio and abc Australia, and a DVD on Turner for the Tate.
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.
December 3, 2026
Dr Maureen Ille
"I started my working life as a secondary school maths teacher, with an interest in Art. While living in the USA in the 1970s I began studying Art History and continued to be a Lifelong Learner, eventually acquiring an MA and PhD. By then I was lecturing to adults for Hull University and the WEA, both courses and individual lectures. My whole life has been about passing on knowledge to others."
Fowers in Art
This talk is about how and why plants and flowers have been depicted, from ancient to modern times, in a variety of media for a variety of purposes.