Arcadia Education offers a range of after-dinner talks tailored to the needs of the specific commission / venue. A given talk can be as much Art Historical as company-specific; always tailored to suit the client’s individual needs. After-dinner talks will typically last 30 minutes. Thought-provoking subject matter will, ideally, stimulate further debate. It is expected that the speaker will naturally engage in the given dinner party’s ambiance, conversation and company, as a prelim to an after-dinner address and, one hopes, ensuing debate.
Our Talks
Art History
- ‘J-L David and the Napoleonic Adventure: Politics, Propaganda and Patronage’
- ‘Destruction or Revelation? The Restoration of The Sistine Chapel Ceiling’
- Spirit of Place – The Sublime the Numinous & the Sacrosanct: The Rothko Room in Tate Modern
- “The Ocean is an Object of No Small Terror” Turner’s Seascapes, “Soapsuds & Spinach”
- ‘Smoke and Mirrors’ The Mystery of the Arnolfini Marriage
- From Bedpan to Bed: Duchamp’s Ready-Made & its Legacy from Modernism to Postmodernism
- ‘An Artistic Epiphany’: Giotto’s Arena Frescoes in Padua; An Artistic Revolution
- ‘From Fallen Heroine to Femme Fatale’: Portrayals of Women in Pre-Raphaelitism
- ‘Pomp and Circumstance: A Regal Rout.’ Uccello’s Battle of San Romano: Propaganda, Patronage and Pageantry
- ‘The Shock of the New: Impressionism to Iconoclasm
- ‘Ambassadorship and Anamorphosis’ Holbein’s Ambassadors
- ‘Freud in Focus’: Lucian Freud Laid Bare
- ‘Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time’ Bronzino’s Titillating Allegory
- ‘Dots, Daytrips and Dogma’ Seurat’s Bathers at Asnieres
- ‘Four Weddings & A Funeral’ The Iconography of Five Commemorative works
- ‘3 is the Magic Number: The Power of 3 in Art History
- ‘Conquest and Cuckoldry’ Botticelli’s Venus and Mars
- ‘Mythology and Mayhem’ Bacchus and Ariadne by Titian
- ‘The Power of the Portrait’ Approaches to Portraiture across the Ages
- ‘The Raft of the Medusa: The Political Shipwreck of France?’
- ‘Great Moments in Art History’ Seminal Moments in the History of Art
- ‘Tenebrism and Tension’ Caravaggio’s Supper at Emmaus
- ‘Anonymity and Iconography’ The Enigma of the Wilton Diptych
- ‘From Darkness to Light’: The Late Cut-outs of Henri Matisse
- ‘Iconoclasm & Anarchism in Art’: The Dada Revolution and Beyond
- ‘The Blitz Reborn:’ John Virtue’s London Series Paintings
- ‘The Femme Fatale’ late 19th and early 20th century vamps & anti-heroines
- Pea-Soupers. The Thames through the eyes of Turner, Whistler & Monet
- ‘Dutch Courage’. Dutch Painting in the Golden Age
- ‘The Elgin Marbles Museology, Conservationism & National Politics’
Architecture & Design
- ‘Seven Architectural Wonders of the World’
- ‘The Parthenon versus the Pantheon: Two Heavyweights of the Ancient World’
- ‘What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?’
- ‘A Short History of Tall Buildings’. The Rise of the Skyscraper in America & its Legacy
- ‘The Spirit of the Belle Epoque’: Art Nouveau at the Fin de Siecle
- ‘Are you sitting comfortably? Chair Design from Shakers to Conran
Seasonal Features:
- ‘Horror & Terror in Gothicism’: Fuseli’s ‘The Nightmare’ & Surrounding Works
- The Impressionists in Winter: Depictions of Seasonal Change in Impressionism
- The Impressionist Landscape in a New Light: Summer & Sunshine
- ‘Hockney’s Colouristic Utopia’: Springtime in Yorkshire
- Painting the Weather: A Painterly Journey through the Seasons
For Inquiries please use the form below