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Webinar on Zoom. 

Caroline Campbell will reflect on learning and discoveries from the decade-long research that went into the exhibition Siena: The Rise of Painting, which she co-curated at the National Gallery, London, and the Metropolitan Museum, New York, in 2024 25.  She will also discuss new research and ideas that have come out of the exhibition in London and New York.

 

Born and educated in Belfast, Dr Caroline Campbell became Director of the National Gallery of Ireland in November 2022. She is the first woman and the first person from Ulster to hold this role in the Gallery’s 170-year history.Caroline studied Modern History at University College Oxford, and has an MA and PhD from the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London. She is a former Fellow of the Center for Curatorial Leadership, New York. Before joining the National Gallery of Ireland, Caroline was Director of Collections and Research at the National Gallery, London. Earlier in her career, she held curatorial positions at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, the Courtauld Gallery, London, and the National Gallery. She has worked extensively with museums and collections internationally, especially in France, Italy, Germany, Spain and the United States. Caroline has published widely on European art from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century. She has curated and co-curated many exhibitions, including ‘Bellini and the East’ (2005-06); ‘Mantegna and Bellini’ (2018-19) and ‘Siena: The Rise of Painting’ (2024-25), which won the Apollo Exhibition of the Year Prize 2025. Her first book, ‘The Power of Art’, was published in 2023. Caroline is a strong advocate of widening participation and digital engagement in museums. Her interest in art history developed after a visit to the National Gallery of Ireland as a teenager, and she wants all young people to be able to see and enjoy great art.

All members are invited to participate in this year’s AGM which will review the Society’s activities during the year, elect Trustees and other office-holders, and review the Society’s annual accounts.

Participation in the AGM is free of charge but registration is required. Please register by clicking the “book now” button.

The meeting will last approximately 20 minutes and it will be followed at 7 pm by the lecture A Good Match: Livia, Wife of Augustus. By Matthew Dennison.

If you wish to attend the lecture following the AGM, please book separately by heading the relevant event page. Thank you.

 

Join Sunday Times bestselling author Sarah Dunant as she turns her discerning eye to a pivotal moment in history through the voice of one of its most compelling yet, until now, lesser-known characters – the foremost, and greatest, female art collector and patron of the Renaissance, the Marchioness of Mantua, Isabella D’Este. Sarah has used thousands of her letters which she has masterfully woven into this story of a powerful and flamboyant woman who refuses to be bound by the conventions of her age.

Sarah Dunant is a historical novelist, thriller writer, broadcaster and lecturer on women’s lives in Renaissance Italy. Her most recent six novels, set within the Italian Renaissance and weaving cutting-edge historical scholarship into fiction, have become international bestsellers, translated into thirty languages.

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A drinks reception will follow the talk

 

Important Information

DISCLAIMER: By participating in a BIS webinar or live event you automatically agree to authorise recording of audio and visual content during the event and consent to subsequent use of the recording in the public domain. This recording may include questions, comments and poll responses provided by you during the event in addition to your name, voice, image or likeness. This recording will be made available after the conclusion of the live event as part of the BIS webinar archives, and will remain available indefinitely. If you do not wish to consent to the recording, please do not join the event or contact us to discuss your concerns.

Sarah Dunant

Photo credit: Charlie Hopkinson

SOLD OUT!
The explosive story of the terrorist group who brought Italy to a standstill in the 1970s.
In March 1978, the Red Brigades kidnapped former Italian prime minister Aldo Moro,murdering his bodyguards. For nearly two months, they held him hostage while a shocked world looked on, before eventually killing him and dumping his body in the middle of Rome. But who were this terrorist group? What did they want? And how did they continue to operate for almost twenty years, terrifying a nation from 1970 to 1988?  John Foot’s talk will describe how they became the most formidable left-wing terrorist organisation in post-war Western Europe. Drawing their support from the student protest movements of the 1960s, activists and workers radicalised by the ‘hot autumn’ of 1969, the Red Brigades were inspired by terrorist groups from across the world, especially in Latin America. They recognised no rules and authority other than their own, and launched a campaign of murder, kidnap, kneecapping and intimidationthat paralysed Italy’s justice system and reshaped the political landscape. For a time, they were admired as freedom fighters by the Italian left and commemorated as martyrs. Underlining the meticulous research behind his new book on this subject, Foot will outline the true story behind the myths that have grown around the Red Brigades, highlighting the human costs of their actions, as well as their impact on Italian society. He will explain how the contradictions inherent in their actions eventually led to their downfall in a series of high-profile mass trials and the legacy of conspiracy, distrust and bitterness that still lingers in Italy to this day.

John Foot is Professor of Modern Italian History and was recently a Distinguished Visiting Goggio Fellow at the University of Toronto. He has published widely on subjects relating to contemporary Italian history and politics, such as sport and divided memories and psychiatric reform. His most recent books have looked at Italy since 1945 (The Archipelago, 2019), Fascism – Blood and Power (2022) and the Red Brigades (2025).

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A drinks reception will follow the talk
Important Information

 

DISCLAIMER: By participating in a BIS webinar or live event you automatically agree to authorise recording of audio and visual content during the event and consent to subsequent use of the recording in the public domain. This recording may include questions, comments and poll responses provided by you during the event in addition to your name, voice, image or likeness. This recording will be made available after the conclusion of the live event as part of the BIS webinar archives, and will remain available indefinitely. If you do not wish to consent to the recording, please do not join the event or contact us to discuss your concerns.

Was Titian really the greedy old master that history suggests? This lecture reveals how Venice’s greatest painter became Europe’s most sought-after artist through shrewd business strategies and an extraordinary royal partnership. When PhilipII inherited both the Spanish throne and Titian’s services, he commissioned a series of bespoke mythological paintings that would become the most luxurious art ever created. Through masterpieces like Venus and Adonis and Diana and Actaeon, we will explore how Titian developed tailor-made products for the world’s most powerful client – and discover why he waited until just two years before his death to send Philip II his first bill. The story builds to a dramatic confrontation in 1564, when Titian made his boldest business move yet – one that would redefine the relationship between artists and patrons forever.
Discover how Titian transformed from Venetian craftsman to international entrepreneur, creating the template for professional artistic practice that still influences the art world today.

Dr Carlo Corsato is a Venetian-born art historian specialising in Renaissance art and the cultural history of Venice. He works as a curator and in-house educator at the National Gallery, London, where he has developed innovative approaches to engaging diverse audiences with historic art. Carlo has been a Visiting Scholar at St John’s College, Cambridge and has lectured at the universities of St Andrews, Buckingham and the Courtauld Institute of Art. He also leads cultural tours for Martin Randall Travel and teaches for adult education institutions, including Venice in Peril, Morley College, and City Lit. His research focuses on early-modern art in Italy and Flanders, with particular expertise in Venetian painting and archival documentation. Carlo co-edited Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari. Devotional Space, Images of Piety with Prof Deborah Howard—the first comprehensive monograph on the church—and has contributed to major exhibition catalogues including Titian: Love, Desire, Death. His groundbreaking research on Titian’s Magdalens, published in Titian: Themes and Variations, has reshaped understanding of the artist’s commercial practices. He also authored Lives of Titian and Lives of Tintoretto, making available in English crucial sources about these artists for contemporary scholarship.

 

Important Information

 

DISCLAIMER: By participating in a BIS webinar or live event you automatically agree to authorise recording of audio and visual content during the event and consent to subsequent use of the recording in the public domain. This recording may include questions, comments and poll responses provided by you during the event in addition to your name, voice, image or likeness. This recording will be made available after the conclusion of the live event as part of the BIS webinar archives, and will remain available indefinitely. If you do not wish to consent to the recording, please do not join the event or contact us to discuss your concerns.