A stimulating and enjoyable Special Interest Day exploring how and why the city of Paris has acted as both a magnet and a 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.

This will be a three-lecture Special Interest Day, with coffee mid-morning and the opportunity to buy lunch in the Churchill College Dining Hall between lectures two and three. Full lecture details to follow.

Booking is now open, the cost is £35 per person, payable in advance please. Please book at any lecture or email Jacquie mcbridejacquie@gmail.com

BACS is our preferred method of payment:

• The Arts Society Granta
• Sort code 20:17:35 
• Account number 80433713
• Reference Paris

Mary Alexander trained as an art historian and graduated with a BA Hons in History & History of Art (University College London) and later an MA (with Distinction) in History of Art (University College London). She moved to Manchester to take up the post of Assistant Curator at Platt Hall, the Gallery of English Costume, a renowned collection of historic dress. Subsequently she lectured in art history at the University of Leeds, the Open University and Manchester University Extra Mural Department. From 1995 - 2008, she was a Visiting Lecturer at Christie’s Education in London. Mary has also combined academic work with the world of design consultancy. In 1985 she joined Pentagram Design in London, a leading international design consultancy, and coordinated client presentations, publications, conferences and international special events, including the 1986 British Design event in Aspen Colorado. In 1988 she transferred to Pentagram’s New York office with the task of organising an international design conference held at Stanford University involving business, design and education leaders. As an experienced international speaker, Mary lectures regularly for The Arts Society throughout the UK, Europe and Australia and New Zealand. She also contributes articles to magazines, newspapers and professional journals. She was President of The Arts Society Glaven Valley, Norfolk from 2016- 2021.  

Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson are three of the most important British artists of the last century. Friends, neighbours and artistic rivals, their lives were intertwined through their personal relationships as well as through their shared determination to make new and radical forms of art in mid-twentieth century Britain. In this study day we will look at the background to their emergence as dynamic artists fascinated by the cutting-edge ideas of European artists such as Picasso, Brancusi and Mondrian.

This will be a two-lecture Special Interest Morning, with coffee provided between the two lectures. 

Full details to follow. Guide price £30.

Jo 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.