ADFAS Canberra

Monday 20 February – lecture
Hilary KAY**
A Century of Toys

Hilary explores the development of toys from the first clockwork carriages to battery-powered robots, including teddy bears and Mickey Mouse on the way. This is a fascinating insight into social history and the development of children and their toys.

Tuesday 21 February - special interest morning
Hilary KAY**
Behind the Scenes at the Antiques Roadshow including Hilary’s One Woman Roadshow

The Antiques Roadshow is now recording its 34th series.   What has made this programme one of the BBC’s most successful and longest running hits?   Hilary joined the Roadshow in 1979.  Here she gives a fascinating insight, recreating the dramas, the disasters, the exploits, the public at large and life on the Roadshow circuit

Monday 26 March - lecture
Dr Michael O’BRIEN*
The Art and Architecture of the Khmer Empire

The lecture includes a brief account of the geography, the historical sources, the language and religion of the Khmers and traces the development of the empire from small Indianised states in the 6thc to the establishment of their capital in the Angkor region in 803 and on its demise after the middle of the 13th c.

Tuesday 27 March - special interest morning
Dr Michael O’BRIEN*
Hindu Art Archaeology and Mythology

An account of the principal deities of the Hindu pantheon, their common manifestations and some of the associated legends, as depicted in temple sculpture, mostly from South India, but with some examples from Central India and South East Asia and an outline of the evolution of the Hindu Temple from early cave temples and monoliths to elaborate and richly decorated free standing temples.

Monday 23 April - lecture
Antonia SYME**
The Magic of Contemporary Tapestry

The lecture will explain about the Australian Tapestry Workshop and discuss some pieces we know in Canberra and others that are further afield such as the growing and important ‘Embassy Collection’ hanging in several of our Embassies and High Commissions.

Monday 21 May - lecture
Anne SEBBA*
“That Woman” – Wallis Simpson

The lecture is based on at least three years of research into why this Baltimore woman, born in 1896 into relative obscurity, was so demonised by the British establishment and wider commonwealth and how, after she married the ex-King and became Duchess of Windsor, she turned her exile and hatred into a platform from which to launch herself as one of the world’s best dressed women who entertained in the most elegant homes fit for a king – or an ex-King.

Monday 18 June - lecture
Dr Kathleen OLIVE**
The Life Cycle of the Artist in Renaissance Florence

Renaissance artists and artisans were initiated into their crafts from a very early age. As their skills and reputations grew, they could become highly sought after and well remunerated. What qualities were required to reach the dizzying heights of innovation described Giorgio Vasari in his celebrated book Lives? Kathleen explores the career of a Renaissance artist - from the early stages of education, through to the maturity of an artist's professional life - paying particular attention to artists' writings in the fifteenth century and to their self-portraits.

Monday 15 July - lecture
Linda SMITH *
The Camden Town Group

The Camden Town Group was a small short-lived group of artists which flourished between about 1911 and 1914.  It was named after the area of London in which several of its members lived and worked, and was inspired by artists like van Gogh, Gauguin and Cézanne.  Membership of the group was constantly changing and the lecture focuses on a few core members: Walter Sickert, Charles Ginner, Harold Gilman and Spencer Gore.

Monday 20 August - lecture
Dr Geri PARLBY*
Angels, Saints and Virgins – The Extraordinary Art of the Hispanic Andes

When the Spanish tried to Christianise the peoples of South America 500 years ago and teach them how to paint, little did they know that native peoples would learn their skills but make the religious art distinctly their own.  The results are Angels with muskets slung over their shoulders, Virgin Marys shaped like mountains and Saints of all shapes and sizes.

Tuesday 21 August – special interest morning
Dr Geri PARLBY*
The History and Art of the Catacombs of Rome and their Rediscovery during the Counter Reformation

This art reveals the beliefs of not only the pagan, Jewish and Christian communities in the city between the first and fourth centuries but also the ideas of some of the heretical Christian sects of the time.  We will look at how the barbarian invasion finally put paid to the popularity of the catacombs and look at how after centuries of abandonment the catacombs were rediscovered during the Counter Reformation

Monday 17 September - lecture
Charles HAJDAMACH *
20th Century British Glass

Based on his new book, Charles’s talk explores the century of British glass from its height as an Empire to 2000 when the glass industry was decimated by foreign competition.  In between, glassmakers and designers took on board a host of new influences and technologies and created exquisite objects, especially in the Art Deco and post war periods, which still retain their international relevance.  In 1965 the concept of a ‘studio glass movement’ arrived in Britain from America.  With their extraordinary skills and artistic the burgeoning number of studios heralded a new golden age of British glass

Tuesday 18 September – special interest morning
Charles HAJDAMACH *
Three Great Glassmaking Centres: Venice, Bohemia and Britain

For five centuries the glassmakers of Venice, Bohemia and Britain have exerted the greatest influence on the rest of the world’s glassmaking.  This special interest morning will examine the major developments in each country and show the close links and influences that each nation played on each other’s glass product through the centuries.  Images of the factories and working conditions along with portraits of the glassmakers and designers will help place the glass within a social and economic context.

Monday 22 October – lecture
Keir Davidson*
The story of Saihỗji: Musô Soseki and the Moss Garden at Saihỗji, Kyoto

Images of this beautiful garden are amongst the best known of all Japanese gardens.  Moss covered islands joined by turf bridges fill the shady pond, while patches of sunlight pick out rock groupings tucked away amongst dense trees, the moss flowing seamlessly around them.  The path around the pond leads past various buildings, offering ever changing views across the water and into dense trees, before climbing up to a small pavilion flanked by more rock settings in an even more hidden part of the garden on the wooded slope above.