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Tate St Ives Talk

Michael Bird How Artists Made Twentieth-Century Britain

16 March 2023 at 18.30–20.30
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Portrait of author Michael Bird

Join author and art historian Michael Bird to discover some of the many ways in which artists responded to a century of seismic change in Britain.

In this illuminating talk inspired by his new book This is Tomorrow: Twentieth-century Britain and its Artists , Michael Bird will invite you to reflect on a series of transformative moments through the lens of artists’ lives.

You'll meet James McNeill Whistler, embroiled in the culture wars of the late Victorian age. The stories of Barbara Hepworth, Gwen John, Pauline Boty and Mary Kelly bring to life the progress of the women’s movement. The influence of wartime dislocation and global migration is explored through artists including David Bomberg, Frank Auerbach, Magda Cordell and Frank Bowling.

Taking its title from the ground-breaking exhibition at Whitechapel Art Gallery in 1956, This is Tomorrow is the first book to tell the story of art in Britain from the late nineteenth century to the year 2000 in a single narrative.

During the event, the café will be open for refreshments.

About Michael Bird

Michael is an art historian, curator and author of more than a dozen books. These include Artists’ Letters: Leonardo da Vinci to David Hockney, Studio Voices: Art and Life in 20th-Century Britain, The St Ives Artists: A Biography of Place and Time, and 100 Ideas that Changed Art. As Goodison Fellow at National Life Stories, he researched the Artists’ Lives archive and curated the exhibition In Their Own Words at The Lightbox, Woking. In 2018–21, he was Royal Literary Fund Fellow at Exeter University, and in 2022 he co-curated Living the Landscape: Barbara Hepworth, Ben Nicholson and the Artists of St Ives at Museum Belvédère, Heerenveen. He lives in Cornwall.

Tate St Ives

Porthmeor Beach
St Ives
Cornwall TR26 1TG
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16 March 2023 at 18.30–20.30

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