Programme 2025
On this side you can see our lectures and events of the 2025 season.
To get more information about each lecture or event (and to register for a lecture or an event), please click on the picture of the lecture or event or click on the button „More Information„.
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„Monet and the Impressionist Cityscape“ Guided Tour (Members of The Arts Society Berlin only)
"Monet and the Impressionist Cityscape" Guided Tour (Members of The Arts Society Berlin only)
The Alte Nationalgalerie presents Claude Monet’s three earliest views of Paris from the year 1867. This is the first European exhibition of the series since these scenes were painted. The works are considered the first Impressionist cityscapes and inspired artists such as Gustave Caillebotte (1848–1894) and Camille Pissarro (1830–1903) to produce paintings of the modern city under renewal. Monet’s series of paintings from 1867 cast a new creative eye on the modern city. The artist did not visit the famous Louvre to copy works of the Ol...
The Jurassic World of Mary Anning (Courtesy of TAS Hamburg, Zoom only)
The Jurassic World of Mary Anning (Courtesy of TAS Hamburg, Zoom only)
“The Jurassic World of Mary Anning: the pioneering woman paleontologist of the 19th century and her contemporaries" Aaron Hunter, scientist and reserarcher, will give an introduction to 19th century palaeontologist Mary Anning and we will discover how she searched the Jurassic rocks of England's south coast to unearth what were believed to be sea dragons and which we now call marine reptiles. The lecture will look at the social history and influences of Mary Anning and the 19th century scientists that she would have worked with. We will no...
Stone on Stone: The Men Who Built the Cathedrals
Stone on Stone: The Men Who Built the Cathedrals
Standing in the nave of Ely cathedral when she was 14, Imogen stopped listening to the guide saying how long and how high and started wondering how on earth ordinary human beings created sky-scraping, dizzyingly high buildings on which even the top-most parts were delicately decorated. How, why and for whom were her questions. For God, for personal redemption and to make a living are the answers to the last two of those, but the "how" was harder to fathom. In this lecture we meet the Master Masons who both designed the buildings and ran the sit...
After Miss Jekyll: English Gardens of the late 20th and 21st Centuries (Courtesy of TAS Hamburg, Zoom only)
After Miss Jekyll: English Gardens of the late 20th and 21st Centuries (Courtesy of TAS Hamburg, Zoom only)
The long shadow of the Arts and Crafts Movement has hung over English gardening for most of the twentieth century. The dominance of Miss Jekyll and the enduring popularity of gardens at Hidcote and Sissinghurst have proved to be an enduring legacy. There were always subversive undercurrents of alternative styles and influences which, as the new century gets into its stride, have gained a greater importance and momentum. Post-Modernism, rich in symbolism, has, in gardens like Portrack, Little Sparta and Througham Court, explored the worlds of li...
More than just buns: Eating out in Georgian London
More than just buns: Eating out in Georgian London
Georgians of all classes dined out in pubs, coaching inns, French ordinaries and confectioners. They also ate all kinds of street food and had an almost insatiable appetite for buns. On a journey through London we will discover the early morning drinks consumed on the street before dawn, ‘nunchions’ served at coaching inns, Billingsgate dinners, confectioners’ cakes, syllabubs and ices, the proverbially thin ham dished up to diners at Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens, as well as the Jewish takeaway foods of the East End and even London’s first...
Cities of the Hanseatic League
Cities of the Hanseatic League
Beginning in Lübeck and Hamburg in the 13th century, the Hanseatic League eventually linked some 60 European cities in a series of trade agreements that transcended national bounds. Riga, Tallinn, Stockholm, Bruges, London, King’s Lynn, Nuremberg, Bremen, Danzig, Stettin and Konigsberg were all connected by an intricate series of contracts, defended by armed forces and a powerful navy, and vital to the economic prosperity of each city. The Brick Gothic style of architecture developed during this period, and many important churches, town hall...
Betty Joel: Glamour and Innovation in 1930s design
Betty Joel: Glamour and Innovation in 1930s design
Betty Joel, born Mary Stewart Lockhart, ran a furniture making and design business. At its peak, in the 1920s and 30s, Betty Joel Ltd employed 50 craftsmen and had showrooms in Knightsbridge. With no formal training, she created, through a flair for branding and marketing, the leading furnishing company of the day in London. The talk explores her early life and marriage to David Joel, exhibitions, and projects. Her clients included royalty, high society, politicians, banks, hotels (such as the Savoy in London) as well as film companies and thea...
Secrets of Affluent Mayfair
Secrets of Affluent Mayfair
Just north of Piccadilly, in the city of Westminster, is the historic district of Mayfair, now one of the most affluent neighbourhoods in the world. In this armchair tour, we’ll discover the humble early roots of this area and later its aristocratic appeal. We’ll visit famous gardens such as Berkeley Square and Grosvenor Square, see posh shops, private members’ clubs, beautiful buildings including stately Georgian townhouses, plenty of public art and many hidden corners. As we duck in and out of alleyways and mews, we’ll discover some o...
The Land of the Midnight Sun: Norway’s Golden Age of Painting
The Land of the Midnight Sun: Norway’s Golden Age of Painting
Why isn’t Norwegian art better known? Should it be? The late 19th century marked a defining moment in Norway. For the first time romantic painters began to turn to their own land for inspiration. They painted the stormy seas, the towering glaciers and the raw, untamed nature of their homeland. Their aim? To draw attention to the beauty of their country and explore what it meant to be ‘Norwegian’. This talk looks at the artists from Norway’s ‘Golden Age’ who captured the far north with drama and romance and interpreted their wild cou...
300 years of Blenheim Palace’s History – and the continuing Battle for Blenheim
300 years of Blenheim Palace’s History - and the continuing Battle for Blenheim
An overview of Blenheim Palace’s rich and chequered history which looks at why the Palace took so long to build - and why it was never completed; the Dukes and Duchesses that made positive contributions to the Estate as well as those who did exactly the opposite - and, of course a look at the Palace's greatest son - Winston Churchill.
A Dickens of a Christmas and God Bless us Everyone
A Dickens of a Christmas and God Bless us Everyone
Charles Dickens has often been proclaimed as “The Man Who Invented Christmas” and indeed on hearing that Dickens had died, a cockney barrow-girl said: “Dickens dead? Then will Father Christmas die too?” Dickens revived the Christmas traditions with his warm portrayal of Christmas in the domestic setting; with plum pudding, piping hot turkey, games, dancing and family cheer by the hearth. Although he celebrated Christmas in numerous works it is his enduring master piece, ‘A Christmas Carol’ published on 19th December 1843 which immor...