Our Monday lectures are held in St George’s Hall, Blockley at 2.30pm for a 2.45pm start.

MONDAY 21 OCTOBER 2024

Tessa Boase

London’s lost department stores

London’s sumptuous Victorian and Edwardian department stores changed the capital and changed its women. Shoppers of every rank were lavishly wooed, seduced and often undone by the temptations laid out before them in these new ‘cathedrals of desire’.
Starting on Oxford Street’s ‘golden mile’, we will set off on a cultural tour of the capital’s big stores – from snooty Marshall & Snelgrove, to Pontings ‘House of Value’; from Kennards’ wart-removal service to the live flamingos atop Derry & Toms; from Bodgers of Ilford to Bon Marché of Brixton.
How did it feel to enter a great store in 1850 – and in 1950? What was it like to serve? From shoppers to shop girls, publicity stunts to wow factor window dressing this lecture aims to present a fascinating slice of social history with wonderful period images.

Tessa Boase is a freelance journalist, author, lecturer and campaigner with an interest
in uncovering the stories of invisible women from the 19th and early 20th centuries, revealing how they drove industry, propped up society and influenced politics. She is the author of three books of social history: The Housekeeper’s Tale: The Women Who Really Ran the English Country House (2014); Etta Lemon: The Woman Who Saved the Birds (first published as Mrs Pankhurst’s Purple Feather in 2018), and London’s Lost Department Stores: A Vanished World of Dazzle and Dreams (2022). Since uncovering the feminist origins of the RSPB, Tessa has been campaigning for public recognition of its female founders with plaques, portraits and a statue.

MONDAY 18 NOVEMBER 2024

Simon Seligman

Julie Brook

Many viewers of a BBC4 profile of artists who work out in nature, presented by Dr James Fox, were haunted by the fire stacks of the only female artist featured, Julie Brook. Simon’s lecture explores this fascinating artist and the range of her work over four decades in some of the world’s wild places, centred always on her passion for the islands and coast of West Scotland where she lives. From drawings, oil painting and film to her powerful physical interventions in the landscapes of Britain, North Africa and Japan that engage with the elements of earth, air, fire and water, Julie Brook’s work takes its place alongside such pioneers as Andy Goldsworthy, David Nash and Richard Long.
Simon knows Julie well and has access to her archive including never before seen photographs of her work. The lecture, which charts her career, will include fragments from her astonishing art films.

Simon Seligman studied art and architectural history at Warwick University. For 19 years until 2010, he worked at Chatsworth in a variety of roles, latterly as Head of Communications. He has lectured about Chatsworth, the Devonshire Collection and associated topics throughout the UK and on several US tours. Alongside his lecturing, he is a Life Coach in private practice, and works part time for John Ruskin’s charity the Guild of St George.

MONDAY 2 DECEMBER 2024

Alice Foster

The art of partying: a feast for the eyes

We have always enjoyed social gatherings and, as Christmas approaches, we kick off the festive season with this lecture that traces people having fun throughout the ages from Roman times to the present. Through a number of themes, beginning with children learning to party through playing together to courtship and marriage, dinner parties, dancing and finally a bit of excess drinking (the gods of mythology were famous for it), Alice will trace a variety of merrymaking, banqueting, dances and music in a feast of colour.

Alice Foster has lectured for Oxford University’s Department of Continuing Education since 1998. She also lectures at the Ashmolean Museum, the Oxfordshire Museum in Woodstock and gives regular classes in Oxfordshire and Worcestershire. In 2004 Alice joined The Arts Society and has lectured in Great Britain and Europe, and in 2025 will give a lecture tour in Australia. Formerly President of Northleach AS, she is also President of Banbury Fine Arts Society. Since its inception in 2003 Alice has led study holidays with Learn Italy.