Days of Special Interest

How did Denmark, a small nation of only 5.8 million (2018), a faltering state in post-Napoleonic Europe, create and maintain such an influence in the world of art and design?
Session one: some pre- and more recent history
In the 19th century, despite a string of state disasters, Denmark enjoyed a middle-class Guldalder – a Golden Age – nurtured by an affirmation of nationhood with a deep Nordic historical revivalism, philosophy and an interest in natural science and the liberal arts and the emergence of a design ethos.
Session two: gold to stainless steel
We summarise the artistic highlights of 19th century Denmark and her ‘Golden Age’. A closer look at extraordinary artists – such as Thorvaldsen, Eckersberg, Købke and Hammershøi. Coming up to date with Scandi-noir, what do we see in the modern psyche of Denmark?
Session three: from ‘Lures’ to Lurpak:
Lars offers his personal ‘smørrebrød’ selection of Danish themes: Andersen, Kierkegaard, Bohr. Bring your own examples of Danish/Scandinavian artefacts.

At Stretton-on-Fosse Village Hall, GL56 9SR
 
In the fifty years since her death in 1970 at the age of 92, Laura Knight’s reputation has fluctuated hugely. Her achievement of becoming the first woman elected to the Royal Academy in 1936 for many years perhaps harmed rather than enhanced opinions of her. This series of three lectures takes a more nuanced look at Knight’s long career, her struggles for recognition in a male-dominated art establishment, and the bravery with which she shaped her own career as a woman artist. Embedding herself in many marginalised communities, whether impoverished fishermen, gypsies or circus performers, she exposed her own passionate humanity, and made questions of identity, community and self-worth central to her artistic mission.
With the headings ‘Women’, ‘Men’ and ‘Others’, each of the three lectures is built around  networks of personal relationships, exploring how Knight’s strong self-awareness empowered her to negotiate the challenges of the British art world in the early twentieth century, casting her own original light on the whole of society at a time of perpetual flux and upheaval.