Our next jont Study Day is run by TAS Chichester .

Spend  the day travelling along the Spanish Coast, examining the works and legacies of three Spanish artists.  Barcelona grew exponentially in the nineteenth and early twentieth century and Antoni Gaudi’s commissions enhanced this seaside city and left an indelible architectural mark on its streets. The great Pablo Picasso grew up in the Andalucian coastal town of Málaga, once famous for its wines. His own journey by boat first to the windy northern town of La Coruña with its wild coastal beaches and then on to Barcelona will be uncovered during this light-filled Study Day as we look forward to the Summer. Joaquin Sorolla caught the fabulous light of the sea in Valencia, his beloved hometown but he also travelled the length and breadth of Spain exploring its rituals, music, and dance in mountain top towns and near the seaside. 

Booking is now open : click here for booking https://www.theartssocietylavantvalley.org.uk/DocumentStore/2026%20Beside%20the%20Spanish%20Seaside%20Booking%20Form.pdf

How did the British view themselves and their subjects in the era of imperialism?
How did imperial subjects view the British?

This study day considers these questions by exploring a range of images, buildings, objects and art forms from across the British Empire. Beginning with a broad view of imperial art in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries we will go on to focus more closely on imperial India.We will look at Calcutta the vibrant capital city and then look at the life and art of one of India's cultural giants , Rabindranath Tagore.

Image of Queen Victoria presenting a bible

First lecture - Images of the British Empire

Second lecture - Imperial Calcutta; Arts and Architecture

Third lecture - The Art of Rabindranath Tagore.

Click here for booking form :https://www.theartssocietylavantvalley.org.uk/DocumentStore/India%20Study%20Day%20Booking%20Form.pdf

Hosted by The Arts Society Chichester Lavant Valley.  10.45 Assembly Rooms, Chichester

Sarah Lenton has been working in this glorious but disconcerting art form for her entire professional life. Here, she unpacks some of its idiosyncrasies – the huge voices, big gestures, and bizarre plots – and covers practically everything and everyone involved in putting on a show.

She charts opera from its classic 17th-century beginnings to its evolution in the 18th, (brocade, high voices, happy endings), and on through war and revolution to the 19th, (nationalism, grand opera, and dead sopranos).

As we hit the troubled 20th- century, the genre begins to spin out of control but, to everyone’s surprise, it’s landed in the 21st in good shape, with more festivals and opera houses than ever. On the way we discover how closely connected opera is with the politics and tastes of the people who pay for it.

We also look at the ultimate theatre man, Puccini, whose six shows continue to keep most opera houses afloat; and we’ll go backstage to see how on earth - and against all odds - it all comes together. 

10:45       Lecture 1  Opera, the Melting Pot of Culture

11:45       Tea/coffee break (please bring your own flask or takeaway)

12:00       Lecture 2  The Life and Times of Puccini

1:00-2:00 Lunch Interval

2:00-3:00 Lecture 3  Backstage at the Opera

Bring your own lunch and we will provide a glass of wine or soft drinks.

Cost for the day:  Members £35; guests, who must be accompanied by a member, £40 if places are available. 
Please give the name and address of guests and you will be notified of availability with an accompanying request for payment.

BOOKING FORM - Please click here : Now fully booked, waiting list only

Luisella will guide us around the Church of Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, which is located in the heart of the San Polo district of Venice. It is the largest church in the city and has the status of a minor basilica. The church is dedicated to the Assumption of Mary.

The imposing edifice is built of brick and is one of the three notable churches in the city that retain most of their Venetian Gothic appearance. In common with many Franciscan churches, the exterior is rather plain, even on the front facade. The exterior features a bell tower that was repaired in the early 2000's after structural problems.

The interior is notable for many tombs and works of art that accumulated in the centuries after it was built. It contains many very grand wall monuments to distinguished Venetians buried in the church, including a number of Doges. Many of these are important works in the history of Venetian sculpture, including that by Donatello. Paintings in situ include two large and important altarpieces by Titian, the Assumption of the Virgin on the high altar and the Pesaro Madonna in a chapel. The basilica also contains the only rood screen still in place in a church in Venice, a vestige of the Venetian Gothic architecture preceded Venetian Renaissance architecture.

This live tour will be viewed in the Assembly Room in Chichester.
To make this a special day, there will be Italian wine or soft drink and light refreshments to enjoy after the tour. 

Members are welcome to bring a guest.

 Booking Form - Please CLICK HERE

Hosted by The Arts Society Chichester

Revolutionaries need guts, vision and determination to withstand the opposition they will undoubtedly face! Overturning centuries of tradition in art was the challenge for many young sculptors in the early 20th century.

This study day surveys the late 19th century scene in London and Paris before showing how, in Britain, carvings by Jacob Epstein, Eric Gill and Henri Gaudier-Brzeska challenged critical and public taste with their sexual candour and perceived ‘primitivism’. Their work before the First World War paved the way for Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth and their contemporaries,

Three talks will survey the scene in London and Paris: was Rodin the end or the beginning?

‘Raising modern sculpture from the dead’: Epstein, Gill and Gaudier-Brzeska in pre- 1915

London ‘True and pure sculpture’: sculptors, critics and dealers between the wars.

 Booking form - click here

SUMMER SOCIAL 29TH JULY 2024 GOODWOOD HOUSE TOUR AND TEA

Join us at Goodwood House at 1pm for 1.15pm on 29th July for a tour of the ground floor of Goodwood House, about 1 hour, followed by a sit-down afternoon tea. The cost for each member will be £34

Meet in the Car park which is  well sign posted . If anyone needs to be dropped off at the front door that is fine. Any member who is disabled but drives themselves may park at the front door.  Please let us  know of anyone who may need assistance so we can notify the House.

 Please also let us know if you have any dietary requirements

 BOOKING FORM - CLICK HERE

See News for details 

For three hundred years Venice was the most powerful city-state in the Mediterranean, and much of its wealth was put towards ornamenting itself with works of art. Paintings were frescoed onto the ceilings of churches and the facades of palaces along the Grand Canal; canvases were set into gilded altarpieces and the ornate walls of Council Chambers. Art was the outward proof of status, the symbol of the city’s prestige and influence. These golden years of Venice’s history were to produce the works of Titian, Tintoretto and Veronese.

Then, when the Republic collapsed and the city fell into decay, it became a treasure house for the artistic imagination. Painters from all over Europe came to Venice to paint its quiet back waters, its crumbling plasterwork, shadowed doorways and sunlit reflections, and the city was reborn as a romantic vision.

This Study Day look into the artists who have lived and worked in Venice, their styles, their techniques and how each added his own unique contribution to the artistic legend of the city.

Lecture 1: “The origins of Venetian art” looks at the dawn of the Venetian style from the gemlike paintings of Carpaccio to the serene altarpieces of the Bellini. From their studio emerged the enigmatic Giorgione, the most poetic of Venetian artists, and then Titian, whose powerful brushwork and vivid imagination had a profound influence on generations of artists after him.

Lecture 2 “The Golden Age” looks at the high years of Venetian art when Titian’s works were commissioned by every patron in Europe, from the Pope to the Holy Roman Emperor. How his style was then turned and reformed by Tintoretto into turbulent flights of fantasy, the paintings he made for the Scuola Grande di San Rocco flickering with an eerie light. And how the last glories of the republic glow in the ceiling paintings of Tiepolo and the crystal clear cityscapes of Canaletto.

Lecture 3 “Poets, painters & private lives” looks at the years of decline when the faded beauty of the city was rediscovered by Turner who painted it lost in shimmering light, by James Whistler, Bonnington and John Singer Sargent, by Henry James who set stories of delicate melancholy in Venice, and by John Ruskin who measured every building of the city and published his report in the “Stones of Venice”, one of the most influential books of the 19th century.

The Arts Society City of Chichester are presenting this event .  Booking is now full, but there is a waiting list which can be accessed on their website, but please do not send  any payment at this stage.

Booking Forms on the City of Chichester website -  https://theartssocietycityofchichester.org.uk/Special/FutureSpecial.aspx  

The Arts Society Mid Sussex

Special Interest Day 

Wednesday 7th February 2024    10.00 – 15.00/15.30

Ditchling Village Hall, Lewes Road, Ditchling, BN6 8TT

Cost of the day is £50 per person to include coffee and a

hot two course lunch with wine or juice.

The British Empire & Imperial India Images, Architecture and Arts

The Study Day is 3 lectures exploring the Arts and Culture of India and its Imperial Past.

Guest Lecturer 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 the BBC Radio Four’s ‘In Our Time’, discussing the poet and artist Rabindranath Tagore.

 The study day includes the following three lectures

1. Images of the British Empire                                                           

 At the turn of the twentieth century, the British Empire held sway over approximately one quarter of the total population of the world.  The British imperial power was projected through a variety of artistic mediums, from fine portraiture and grand imperial buildings to more popular forms of imagery.  British artists also produced countless images of people from all over the globe who had become subjects of British rule. Through considering a variety of paintings, buildings, and objects from across the empire, this lecture provides a fascinating insight into the ways in which the British viewed themselves and their subjects in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

2. Imperial Calcutta

Calcutta was the second city of the British Empire and a hub of cultural and artistic production throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.  This lecture provides an overview of the arts (poetry, theatre, literature, song) and architecture of this extraordinary city, which was India’s capital until 1911. At the epicentre of the ‘Bengal renaissance’, Calcutta played a central role in shaping the arts and culture of modern India, as a huge variety of artists sought to interpret India’s classical heritage in new ways and combine this heritage with Western cultural forms.  The lecture examines how Calcutta’s arts and architecture were affected by British rule and explores the fascinating ways in which Indian artists viewed the British in India

3. 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 artist - we will take a detailed look at his life and art.

 Agenda : Approximate timings.

 9.30      Doors open

10.00 _ 11.00  Lecture 1 - Images of the Britih Empire

11.00 – 11.30  Comfort Break

11.30 – 12.30  Lecture 2 - Imperial Calcutta: Arts and Arcitecture

12.30 – 14.00  Lunch

14.00 – 15.00  Lecture 3 - The Art of Rabindranath Tagore

 If you would like to attend this Special Interest Day, please make a bank transfer payment of £50 per person to:

 Lloyds Bank

Account name: The Arts Society Mid Sussex

Sort Code : 30-98-97

Account Number: 72680163 (this is a business account )

Please reference the payment ‘India’. All payments should be regarded as non- refundable. An e ticket , with any additional information will be sent nearer the date. 

 If you have any special dietary requirements eg. vegetarian, diabetic etc, please let us know well in advance as we have to advise the caterer.  You can get in touch with us by email at membership.midsussex@theartssociety.org. 

Joint Study Day at The Assembly Room Chichester on 31 October, 2023

10:45 Lecture 1  Fire, Flood, Pollution, a World War and its aftermath

11:45                   Coffee break (Please BYO)

12:00 Lecture 2  Depression and Bankruptcy

1:00                     Lunch hour
Bring your own picnic lunch and we will provide a glass of wine or soft drinks.

2:00   Lecture 3  Taxation, Demolition and a Revival 1950-2000

3:00                      Finish

Cost for the Day is:-
£35 for members.
£40 for Guests if places are available (accompanied please by a member).

There is something incomparably romantic about a long-lost country house, with its echoes of vanished grandeur and an irretrievable way of life.

Over the years, hundreds of these houses have fallen victim to social change, human foibles and the madness of war. Only in the last few decades has there been a resurgence of interest in and celebration of these treasures of our national heritage.

Although Britain still possesses some of the finest of these architectural treasures, many have been destroyed. A single ruined lodge or pavilion, an over-grown drive, or group of mature trees, are sometimes all that now exists to remind us of a lost house and pleasure-ground.

Booking Forms please CLICK HERE

Presented by The Arts Society Chichester Lavant Valley,
in association with the Arts Societies of Chichester, City of Chichester and Chichester Evening

Gustave Caillebotte organised some of the Impressionist exhibitions, bought their pictures, and donated them to the French nation; yet by the 20th century his own pictures had been forgotten. The reason? He retired from the controversy surrounding impressionism before it became popular and was of independent means, so he gave away many of his pictures, and they have remained in private collections. However, his contribution was unique especially his views of the remodelled Paris of the 1870s, which convey far more clearly than any other French painter how this great city was experienced. He was an eccentric and part of the fun of his discovery is his unpredictability! 

Largely because James Tissot refused to exhibit with his friend Degas and the Impressionists he was relegated by history to the ranks of the reactionary Salon and dismissed as a painter of fashion plate superficiality. Over the last 20 years however, a more just appreciation of his art has emerged which recognises his unique contribution to our view of 19th century society in both France and Britain. Tissot’s pictures combine psychological penetration, precise observation, indefatigable draughtsmanship and a subtle humour, to pass comment on Victorian society; but they also tell us about a man who fell in love and whose life was changed because of it. 

By kind invitation of The Arts Society Chichester

For The Arts Society Chichester's Booking Form - CLICK HERE

Three lectures on:-  

Jerome Kern- The 'Daddy' of them all ;

Irving Berlin- The Centurion of Song;

Cole Porter- The Original 'Sophisticat'

 Paying tribute to the lives and work of three great songwriters who defined popular music during the first half of the last century – and the unforgettable legacy they left behind for us all. Enjoy their beautiful songs, as fresh and inspiring today as when they were first written, and learn about these musical geniuses who cast their spell on us all.

Pip Burley began his musical career playing Rock'n'Roll in the 60s and 70s as well as working with the big bands - including Sydney Lipton, Joe Loss and Ken Mackintosh. He went on to compose and record music for commercials, theatre, film and television and, in 1990, won an Ivor Novello Award for Best Television Theme music for The Darling Buds of May - a TV series he also produced (discovering Catherine Zeta-Jones in the process). Other television successes include the multi-award winning series A Touch of Frost, the most watched police series of all time, created for and starring David Jason. As a sideline he also managed to start and run an advertising agency! Since then Pip has been lecturing widely about his career based on his book Briefest Encounters and, more recently, has devised a series of talks entitled 'The Golden Age of Song', featuring the lives and music of great composers of popular song, lavishly illustrated with slides, videos and occasional demonstrations on the piano.

Click  here for the Booking Form

Organised by The Arts Society, Chicheser

At 10:45, The Assembly Room, Chichester

Talk 1: Highlights of Maritime Art From the 16th Century to the Present Day.

Dr Taylor introduces the subjects and themes of traditional marine painting in oils and focuses on the development of the genre in Britain, and the historic buildings of Greenwich. Subjects include dramatic sea battles, ship portraits, ports, harbours and fishing, Captain James Cook and Vice-Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson, royal yachts and races, clipper ships and ocean liners, as well as official war artists.

Talk 2: Grace Darling and the Fine Art of Saving Lives at Sea.

Addresses the story of Grace Darling, who became celebrated for her daring rescue of survivors of the SS Forfarshire from the Longstone Lighthouse off the Northumberland coast in 1838. Grace, her family, and her deed were featured by a wide range of artists who helped to keep her in the public eye until the 1970s.

 Talk 3. Norman Wilkinson – The Man behind Dazzle Camouflage. 

Recounts the remarkable invention and application of Dazzle Camouflage, also known as Dazzle painting. Invented in 1917 by Norman Wilkinson, thousands of British and Allied ships were painted with vivid and violently contrasting patterns of colour to deter U-boat attacks. The scheme continues to inspire art and design.

Obtain Booking Form from:-

The Arts Society Chichester website "Our Society", "Documents",

and click the 15 November 2022 entry.

(https://www.theartssocietychichester.org.uk/AboutUs/Documents.aspx) 

Image: The Fighting Temeraire by JMW Turner, National Gallery

A stimulating and enjoyable Special Interest Day exploring how and why the city of Paris has acted as both a magnet and cauldron of talent for aspiring artists and designers.

Discover more about the key events and personalities shaping the 'City of Light' during the first half of the twentieth century.

Looking beyond the mainstream, we will identify the creative individuals, including newly emerging female talents, who shaped the Parisian concept of 'modernity' in art, design, interiors, fashion, and photography. Whether strolling along Haussmann's new boulevards, ascending the magnificent staircase of Garnier's Opéra House, calling into an artist's studio, cafe, nightclub, or couture fitting, we will recreate the sense of 'being there'.

Literary descriptions by Zola, Stein, Cocteau, Hemingway, and Fitzgerald will accompany the sumptuous visual details photographed especially for this purpose. Comparisons between the international Paris exhibitions of 1900, 1925 and 1937 will shed light on changing social/cultural issues, rapid technological change, and the key role of couture and fashion in French identity, especially during the German Occupation, and immediately after the Liberation.

This new Special Interest Day 'Why Paris' has evolved by popular request from many societies who have enjoyed her 'New York New York' SID. A similar inclusive and exploratory approach is used with location maps, using both contemporary and old photographs of the city, various art and design media, to share many of the questions which have fascinated me over the years. Whether you know the city well or not at all, there will be new and exciting discoveries for everyone.

10.30 : La Belle Époque - city of pleasure and reinvention 1890s - 1914

11.30 : tea/coffee break

11.45 : Partying into the Future 1920s and 30s

12.45 : lunch interval

  1.45 : Paris Exposition 1937, Occupation and Defiance

  2.45 : Vote of thanks

Mary will bring a selection from her personal vintage postcard collection, advertisements, fashion plates, and historic exhibition catalogues for your enjoyment.

Mary Alexander

Thirty years' experience as a lecturer, with a BA in History and History of Art and a MA with distinction in History of Art from University College London. Experience includes public lectures in museums, tutoring for the Open University, visiting lecturer at Christie's Education in London, museum curator at Platt Hall, the Gallery of Costume, Manchester.

Now a freelance lecturer to various arts, heritage and antiquarian societies. She also worked in Pentagram design consultancy in London and New York, organising conferences and special events. Author of various articles on design and visual awareness issues, her background combines an unusual blend of academic and visual communications skills. Lectured for ADFAS Australia and New Zealand in 2011, 2013 and 2016.

Mary is an enthusiastic member and President of The Arts Society Glaven Valley.

Booking Form: Click here  

This Study Day consists of three lectures:-

• The Victorian legacy and the rise of the drawing room dramas of Noel Coward and Terence Rattigan;
  ​
• The post-war Revolution and the emergence of the Angry Young Men, such as Osborne; and
   
• The 1960s and after - a Golden New Age?  From Pinter and Orton to Hair and Oh Calcutta.

Giles Ramsay is an independent theatre director and producer who specializes in creating new work with artists in developing countries. He is the Founding Director of the charity Developing Artists (www.developingartists.org), a Fellow of St. Chad’s College, Durham University and Course Leader in Theatre at The Victoria and Albert Museum in London.   Giles combines academic analysis with hands on experience to bring a unique insight to the world of the theatre.

Kindly organised by Claire Power

Booking Forms CLICK HERE

The Arts Society Chichester welcome our Members to attend their meeting on Tuesday 16th November in the Assembly Rooms. 

Tickets £29 each, payable direct to "The Arts Society Chichester" bank account. Ref: "Study Day". Please apply to info@theartssocietychichester.org.uk or to peterca@:me.com

About 3,000 years ago the Chinese began to create objects out of porcelain, but it took them the next 1,000 to 1,500 years to perfect the process. The dragon, symbolising the Emperor of China, frequently adorned these objects, and blue from the pigment cobalt oxide was often used for decoration. The winds drove the trading ships carrying porcelain and other products as far as the Middle East where blue porcelain in particular was much treasured by those of the Islamic faith. Later, the East India Company and others brought some of these pieces to Europe thus giving rise to the golden age of trade in Chinese export porcelain. This is a story of power and exploration, involving innovative technology, skilled craftsmanship, and fine artistry.

 1045-1145: Porcelain for the Chinese Emperors. The first lecture traces the history of porcelain manufacture in Jingdezhen, considers the profound symbolism of the dragon and other designs, and looks at examples of Chinese imperial porcelain.

 1200-1300: Chinese Export Porcelain. The second lecture explains how Chinese porcelain arrived in Europe during the Middle Ages as diplomatic gifts, and through pilgrimages to the Eastern Mediterranean where it had arrived in the 9th century. The tea trade of the 18th century brought in its wake millions of pieces of blue and white and rarer coloured porcelain.

 1300-1400: Lunch – please bring your own.

 1400-1500: A Closer Look at Blue and White Porcelain. The third lecture looks closely at the manufacture and decoration of blue and white porcelain, distinguishing between the designs made for the Imperial Court and those made for the gentry and for export. By the 18th century blue and white was an essential fashionable component in England, and was being copied by factories such as Bow and Worcester.

POSTPONED - new date to be agreed

This highly acclaimed study day of three lectures will take us on a merry romp through 450 years of Theatre.

The reign of Elizabeth I saw the birth of England’s greatest playwright, William Shakespeare, and the building of the Globe Theatre, where many of his plays were performed. This was the beginning of the golden age of theatre. With the Civil War this era came to an end, but was succeeded after the Restoration by the rise of the Comedy of Manners, featuring the plays of dramatists such as Congreve, Wycherley and Farquhar. Their plays became popular with the public due to their complicated plots as well as their wit, cynicism and licentiousness.

The 18th century brought the opening of the Drury Lane and Covent Garden theatres and the rise of the great theatre managers, David Garrick and Henry Irving, known for their declamatory style. The Victorian age was characterised by melodrama, music hall and ‘freak shows’.

The 20th century began with the drawing room comedies of Noel Coward and Terence Rattigan, but by the 21st century both playwrights had fallen out of fashion. A breakthrough came in the 1960s with John Osborne’s Look Back in Anger. This new naturalistic style of acting was a revolution in theatre, and Osborne was quickly followed by others including Harold Pinter, Joe Orton, Edward Bond and Tom Stoppard. Another golden age of theatre had begun.

Giles Ramsay is an independent theatre director and producer who specializes in creating new work with artists in developing countries. He is the Founding Director of the charity Developing Artists (www.developingartists.org), a Fellow of St. Chad’s College, Durham University and Course Leader in Theatre at The Victoria and Albert Museum in London.   Giles combines academic analysis with hands on experience to bring a unique insight to the world of the theatre.

Click here for a Booking Form

Organiser Janet Smith

. 

Unfortuntely, the Summer Social has had to be cancelled

Anthea Streeter presents a Study Day of three lectures in The Chichester Assembly Room.

Art Deco a celebration of the machine age. 

It permeated the worlds of architecture, graphics, fashion, industrial design and other areas of creativity. It also reflected the unprecedented change which characterised the first half of the twentieth century and is one of the most exciting chapters in the history of the decorative arts

Click here for a Booking Form

Sussex Area Special Interest Day of three lectures at The Ark, Mount Lane, Turners Hill, West Sussex RH10 4RA. 10am to 3pm.

It has long been recognised that the worlds of the visual and aural arts link with extraordinary power when one medium inspires the other. This lecture, which spans over 600 years of the arts, analyses and discusses a range of related works, bringing together the music of Martinu with the frescoes of Piero della Francesca, Botticelli’s Birth of Venus with Respighi’s Trittico botticelliano, Böcklin’s Isle of the Dead with Rachmaninoff’s symphonic poem and Poet Mondrian’s Broadway Boogie Woogie with the piano playing of Albert Ammons. 

Click here for the Booking Form

Sussex Area Special Interest Day of three lectures at The Ark, Mount Lane, Turners Hill, West Sussex RH10 4RA. 10am to 3pm.

This SID will look at the work of Frida Kahlo (1907-1954) and Diego Rivera (1886-1957), two of the most significant artists of the twentieth century. It will chronicle their flamboyant lives and turbulent marriage and will also examine their role in Mexican history. Key figures in the Mexican cultural renaissance of the 1930s, Kahlo and Rivera gave new value to the ancient cultures of the New World. After the revolution of 1910, at a critical time in Mexico’s turbulent history, they helped it to explore its identity as a post-Colonial nation.

Click here for the Booking Form

Sussex Area Special Interest Day of three lectures at The Ark, Mount Lane, Turners Hill, West Sussex RH10 4RA. 10am to 3pm.

From the Elizabethan playhouses to the rise of the National Theatre, from Shakespeare to Stoppard, this SID will be a romp through four hundred and fifty years of British theatre.

Click here for the Booking Form

A special early evening party to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of The Arts Society

6pm to 8pm on 19th June 2018 at The Assembly Room Chichester

5:45pm   Doors open
6:00pm   A Musical Celebration with Peter Medhurst 
7:00pm   Drinks and Canapés 
8:00pm   Close
 

In a change to the original programme, Peter Medhurst will provide a special ‘Musical Celebration’. This will be followed by a drinks party with canapés (prepared by Nik Westacott). There will be an opportunity to browse showcases of the work of our society and our joint projects with the other Chichester Arts Societies.  

For further information contact Claire Power (email address on your membership card).

Golden Anniversary Lunch

Friday 20th April 2018

2018 marks 50 years since Patricia Fay founded NADFAS, which has now evolved into The Arts Society, and we are holding this special lunch at the Duchess’s Stand, Epsom Racecourse, to celebrate the occasion. 

Individual travel arrangements required  

Click here for a booking form

 For a post lecture Reading and Location List click here.

A personal ‘virtual’ tour in which we unashamedly cherry-pick the artistic highlights and icons of New York. We will consider the influence of ‘new money’ on art patronage and track the move of fashionable society from Washington Square, so beloved by Henry James and Edith Wharton, in the relentless move uptown. Digital photography will be used to full effect with visual collages and exquisite details to re-create the atmosphere of the brownstones and high society clubs of Gramercy Park, the Rockefeller Center and Radio City Music Hall, the grand hotels and nightclubs, the 21 Club and the Speakeasy, the building of the great art collections including the Metropolitan Museum and the Guggenheim. Whether you know and love New York or maybe have never visited, join Mary Alexander and have fun discovering more about the personalities of the artists, designers, patrons and social climbers who shaped this extraordinary and ever-changing city. The aim will be to create the sense of ‘being there’ and to capture the vibrancy and energy of the city. 

Click here for a booking form or collect one at our next meeting

BOOKING CLOSED

Join us for a wonderful day at Arundel Castle.

After tea/coffee on arrival enjoy an exclusive tour of the interior of the castle, a special two course lunch + coffee and freedom of the castle, grounds and gardens in the afternoon.

Set high on a hill, this restored medieval castle commands the landscape with magnificent views across the South Downs and the River Arun.

Founded at the end of the 11th century, it has been the family home of the Dukes of Norfolk and their ancestors for nearly 1000 years. Many of the original features such as the crenellated Norman keep, gatehouse and barbican and the lower part of Bevis Tower survive. Between the 1870s and 1890s the house was almost completely rebuilt and the magnificent architecture in Gothic style is considered to be one of the great works of Victorian England.

Enjoy the grandeur of the finely preserved interior with its fascinating furniture, tapestries and rare collection of paintings by renowned artists including Van Dyck, Gainsborough and Canaletto.

After our lunch, enjoy the freedom of the castle grounds and gardens. Look out for the 'Allium Spectacular' in the walled gardens.

Members and those on the Membership waiting list are welcome. Each can bring a guest.

Cost for the day £42  (including lunch, entry fee, special guided tour, refreshments)

Organiser: Claire Power

Click here for a booking form  

This study day is intended to explore key works by the best painters of a generation and demonstrate how seventeenth century painting is stylistically and thematically interlinked across the continent of Europe.

1.  Caravaggio: the Bad Boy of the Baroque. This scandalous and sometimes vicious painter produced work with cinematic compositions and intensely visceral details. His downfall is the stuff of a film not yet made and despite the artist dying prematurely his canvases influenced  the generation that followed.

2.   Rubens: Poses, Position and Property. Writhing sea nymphs with dimpled bottoms were only a small
 part of this prolific painter’s offerings. Charm personified, Rubens worked for every major court in Europe, and his career caused envy and created inspiration in equal parts.

3.   Velazquez: in Search of Status. From the humble origins of painting eggs, this sensational Spaniard produced a portrait that raised the eyebrow of a Pope and astonished the Italians, as well as a painting that was described by a contemporary as the ‘theology of painting’.

Organiser: Claire Power

Fully Booked

Click here for a booking form

Art Nouveau was the first attempt to create an international modern style. It had its fullest flowering on the European Continent during the 1890s. At this time progressive architects and designers renounced the tired formulae of historicism in favour of a ‘New Art’.

Lecture 1: The first lecture begins with examples of Art Nouveau set alongside pieces from the following Art Deco period, so that a clear distinction can be made between the two styles. We will then look at how the English designers such as William Morris, Charles Voysey and Aubrey Beardsley were the first to break with the past. Influenced by nature, and the clarity and simplicity of Japanese artefacts, their work pointed a new way forward; and the influential store Liberty of London played a crucial role in importing and commissioning new designs.

Lecture 2:  shows how the various countries in continental Europe responded to the New Art, firstly looking at Belgium and France. Hector Guimard’s organic, plant-like forms for the Paris Metro as well as Rene Lalique’s naturalistic jewellery demonstrate the mainstream of Art Nouveau. We look at Gaudi’s fantastical designs in Barcelona, and then move to 
Scandinavia, taking a close look at the prevailing National Romanticism of Finland.   

Lecture 3:  examines quite a different manifestation of Art Nouveau. This comes in the rectilinear forms of Charles Rennie Mackintosh in Scotland and his Austrian contemporaries, Olbrich and Hoffman in Vienna. The early work of the American architect Frank Lloyd Wright is brought into context and the afternoon closes with the exquisite glass designs of Louis Comfort Tiffany.

Organiser: Claire Power

USE COLLEGE ENTRANCE AND PARKING

Our 2016 Summer Social will be held at West Dean College. After coffee, tea and biscuits on arrival, we will be given a house and architectural tour and will also have an opportunity to visit some of the fascinating workshops. A two course lunch will be served in the magnificent Old Library, which has incomparable views across the gardens and downs.  

There will be time in the afternoon to explore the beautiful gardens.

Cost for the day (incl. lunch) Members: £35, Guests: £40

click here for menu

10am to 3pm at “The Ark”, Turners Hill, W. Sussex, RH10 4RA                                                                              

Cost: £28 (incl. Morning Coffee and Buffet Lunch)

CLICK HERE for Booking Form and Information for all three Special Interest Days

---------------------------------------------------------

We start the day in the Paris of 1850 – the lively city of cabaret’s, can-can girls and artistic bohemia. We follow the course of art from academic pictures, through the Impressionists, the Post-Impressionists and beyond, looking at how the thread of art leads ever forward towards the present.
The second Session looks at the huge number of artists in Paris at this time and at the lively life they lived there. We consider the five major art groups comprising the Ecole de Paris, the Ecole Francaise, Purism, Dadaism and Surrealism. We leave Paris for this session with WW11 approaching and many of our artists departing for New York.
The afternoon session looks briefly at the history of modern art in New York before rejoining our French artists in the city. We see how Peggy Guggenheim looked after her old French pals and introduced them to her New York set.  

10am to 3pm at “The Ark”, Turners Hill, W. Sussex, RH10 4RA                                                                              

Cost: £28 (incl. Morning Coffee and Buffet Lunch)

CLICK HERE for Booking Form and Information for all three Special Interest Days

-------------------------------------------------------------

The Secret Surface: how time and restoration transform the appearance of paintings. Art restoration has been the subject of some notorious controversies. We get up to speed with the issues, in a voyage of discovery down through the painted surface from varnish to canvas, explaining the transformations behind the debates. We look at dramatic before and after details in some famous pictures including Holbein’s Ambassadors & the Sistine Chapel Ceiling.
Fine Art Forgery: Craftsmanship or Conjuring Trick? Fake scientific and documentary evidence can play as big a role in forgery scandals as clever fabrication of the artwork itself, as we discover in a “ripping yarns” survey featuring the familiar Tom Keating and Van Meegeren amongst a supporting cast of exotic rogues. We come right up to date with the Greenhalghs of Bolton.
Who Says? Can we trust the experts on good and bad in art? Art critics and experts are often hilariously lampooned, and we focus on the bafflingly mysterious Polish Rider in the Frick to evaluate a decades-long project to settle just which paintings Rembrandt did. That’s ended up as much a study of the trickiness of attribution as of Rembrandt. Right now world Leonardo authority Martin Kemp is utterly convinced he has discovered a new work by the master – but many specialists beg to differ. We review a number of controversies, and feel the fury of judges listening to connoisseurial assertions, when questions of quality come to court. But the minefields facing experts need not deter the rest of us from making artistic judgments just based on life experience we all have.

10am to 3pm at “The Ark”, Turners Hill, W. Sussex, RH10 4RA                                                                              

Cost: £28 (incl. Morning Coffee and Buffet Lunch)                                                                      

 CLICK HERE for Booking Form and Information for all three Special Interest Days

-----------------------------------------------------------------

When Gainsborough moved to Bath in 1758 it was a bustling cosmopolitan spa centre experiencing a phenomenal building boom, attracting nobility and wealthy merchants alike, and described by Mrs Delany at the time as ‘the busiest idle place in the world’. At the height of the season it was estimated that Bath could accommodate some 12,000 visitors, and many stayed for several weeks to drink the waters, attend concerts, shop for luxury goods and generally gossip and parade on the fine promenades. Contemporary journals and letters (including Gainsborough’s witty correspondence) and caricatures are used to bring the city, its buildings and personalities to life. The day explores how and why a young, entrepreneurial Gainsborough identified Bath as ‘the’ place from which to build his reputation. What was the experience like for those who jostled to sit to Mr Gainsborough wduring the Bath season? What did High Society do to entertain themselves? The focus will be on Gainsborough’s work in Bath and comparisons will be made with his contemporaries and rivals. For painting was, in Gainsborough’s words, ‘a little business for the eye’. 

Click here to book tickets via the NADFAS website.

Masters of the Everyday: Dutch Artists in the Age of Vermeer- at Buckingham Palace
1st December 2015
10:45am
Price: £22.00

NADFAS is delighted to announce a special event for members on Tuesday 1st December.

Held at The Queen's Gallery, Buckingham Palace, members are now able to book tickets to this exclusive daytime event, based around the upcoming ‘Masters of the Everyday: Dutch Artists in the Age of Vermeer’ exhibition.

After tea and coffee on arrival, Curator and NADFAS Vice-President Desmond Shawe-Taylor will give a talk on the exhibition, following which, you will be able to enjoy the show at your leisure, utilising a complimentary audio guide. You are then welcome to take advantage of an exclusive 10% discount in the shop, which has many items designed for the Royal Collection.

About the Exhibition

Nearly 30 of the finest 17th and 18th century Dutch paintings in the Royal Collection, including Vermeer’s The Music Lesson, will be brought together in a this new exhibition. Masters of the Everyday: Dutch Artists in the Age of Vermeer includes works by some of the finest artists of the day, among them Gerrit Dou, Pieter de Hooch and Jan Steen.

This exclusive event in the wonderful venue of Buckingham Palace is not to be missed! Places are strictly limited so please book early to avoid disappointment. 

Our 2015 Summer Social is to be held at the delightful venue of Champs Hill set in 27 acres of gardens and woodlands and featuring many splendid sculptures. The Music Room houses a wonderful exhibition of paintings. We will enjoy a recital of music by Saint-Saens and Poulenc given by the husband and wife team, Carole Presland and Paul Smith, before concluding the evening with a two-course supper.

click here to go to the Application Form

The LVDFAS Committee invite members to our Spring Seminar. 

• Look around  a series of showcases to discover more about the work of Lavant Valley DFAS.
• Contribute your ideas for future lectures, visits, tours and events.
• Find out more about joining some of our volunteering activities or becoming part of our team.
• Enjoy socialising with other members over a free sandwich buffet.

Contact Claire Power to book your place. Tel 01243 379140 or e-mail clpower@btinternet.com. Booking is essential if you would like lunch  

The Royal Collection is the last great European dynastic collection to survive in royal ownership, comprising over 485,000 objects collected over the last 500 years. It includes a large number of the best examples of many forms of art, from paintings to Old Master drawings, from sculpture to ceramics, from furniture to clocks, from jewellery and gold and silver objects to books, manuscripts and watercolours. The collection is wholly unlike a museum collection. The latter seeks to be comprehensive; the former is primarily a testament to the personal collecting tastes of members of the royal family. The study day seeks to illustrate the works of art, their position in the history of art and the personalities of the royal collectors. From Henry VIII and Holbein, one moves to Charles I, probably the most perceptive of all royal collectors, with his remarkable purchases of works by Raphael, Mantegna, Rubens and van Dyck. Much of his collection was sold by Oliver Cromwell, but Charles II re-acquired some of the lost treasures and added others, including 600 drawings by Leonardo da Vinci. George III added to the collection, with thousands of Old Master drawings; paintings; porcelain; clocks and watches; and a huge number of books. George IV was undoubtedly the most prolific royal collector and his taste was extraordinarily diverse. He filled his opulent residences with superb works of art, including paintings, sculpture, ceramics, furniture, gold and silverware and exotic clocks. Victoria & Albert were enthusiastic patrons of the arts. They favoured contemporary artists and commissioned elaborate tableware from British manufacturers; but they also bought important early Italian paintings. The habit of royal collecting has continued to the present day.

With Douglas Skeggs, discover the course of the brutal, determined Romanov dynasty which ruled Russia for over 300 years; from Peter the Great, who swept away Russia's medieval trappings, modernised the state and created a powerful army and navy, through to his eccentric daughter Elizabeth to Catherine the Great – the most powerful of all the empresses of Russia. Then to the tragic figure of Nicholas II, the last Tsar, whose death in a cellar in July 1918 ended the reign of this turbulent and ill-fated family. Go to the 'Documents' section in 'About Us' to view and download more information and an application form.

By popular request, a 'time-travel' virtual tour with Mary Alexander which unashamedly cherry picks the art and design highlights of New York. Whether you know the 'Big Apple' or maybe have never visited, have fun discovering more about the personalities of the artists, designers, patrons and social climbers who shaped this extraordinary and ever changing city. Go to the 'Documents' section in 'About Us' to view and download more information and an application form.

To be held at “The Ark”, Turners Hill, W. Sussex, RH10 4RA Cost: £28 per day (incl. Morning Coffee and Lunch) Timing: 10.00am to 3.00pm An application form can be found in the 'About Us/Documents' page

To be held at “The Ark”, Turners Hill, W. Sussex, RH10 4RA Cost: £28 per day (incl. Morning Coffee and Lunch) Timing: 10.00am to 3.00pm An application form can be found in the 'About Us/Documents' page

To be held at “The Ark”, Turners Hill, W. Sussex, RH10 4RA Cost: £28 per day (incl. Morning Coffee and Lunch) Timing: 10.00am to 3.00pm An application form can be found in the 'About Us/Documents' page

Cost £24.50 including coffee and lunch. For further details of this event please contact: Kate Pittom E-mail: pittomtk@madasafish.com 01243 - 542106

Our speaker was Jane Tapley, whose wide ranges of interests include 18th- and 19th- century writers, food and the theatre. In her first lecture, ‘The Life and Times of Jane Austen’, Jane Tapley vividly brought to life the family of this highly talented author. We learnt of the influence of her parents on her writing – her mother, who in between bearing eight children found time to write very amusing doggerel verses, and her clergyman father, in whose extensive library the young Jane Austen was free to browse. We saw the places that meant so much to Jane; the way in which some of her family served as models for the characters in her novels, and how the social conventions of her time informed much of her writing. Extracts from her novels and film versions of them reminded us of her piercing wit and acute observation of the social mores of her time. After the lecture we were taken round the house in two groups by very enthusiastic and knowledgeable volunteer guides. We learned of the life of succeeding generations of the family who lived at Uppark, the Fetherstonehaughs, and saw their beautiful collections of art, furniture and paintings and the changes to the design of the house implemented by different generations. Stories were told of scandals and parties with guests as varied as the Prince Regent and Emma Hamilton. Life below stairs was displayed in the complete servants' quarters in the basement set out as they were in Victorian days when H G Wells' mother was housekeeper. In 1989 a major fire almost destroyed Uppark House. However, thanks to the prompt action at time in rescuing the major part of the collection and the subsequent work of the teams of restorers, Uppark rose phoenix-like from the ashes. A delicious lunch in the elegant restaurant with its beautiful views over the grounds was served by the friendly and efficient restaurant staff and provided a time to relax and get to know each other. After lunch we had the choice to explore the beautiful and peaceful garden, inspired by Capability Brown and Humphry Repton, with its sweeping views over the Downs as far as the English Channel and the Isle of Wight. When we re-entered the restaurant from the gardens for Jane’s lecture, from Soup to Syllabub’, we were greeted by the sight of two tables set with an array of the most beautiful china, linen and silver. Jane described the ways in which these items would have been used and are still used when she gives a Georgian Dinner Party as part of the Bath Festival. This provided a very good backcloth to her entertaining and informative lecture on Georgian food and dining customs. The elegancy of the Regency period was not always reflected in manners of the diners! All too soon our day of fellowship, fun and learning came to an end.