We are pleased to share with you new free online talks inspired by our exhibitions
Canaletto: Painting Venice
Why we aren’t saving Venice – and how it could still be saved
7pm Thursday 17 June
Join Anna Somers Cocks at to discover why the future of Venice is uncertain and what we might be able to do to change the fate of the city.
This online lecture by esteemed journalist, editor and publisher, and former Chair of Venice in Peril, Anna Somers Cocks OBE will lay out the latest predictions on sea-level rise and how this will affect the eastern Mediterranean, the lagoon and the city. It will unmask why a long-term plan to defend one of the most beautiful creations, Lord Byron’s “fairy city of the heart”, (or, for that matter, address the tourist problem or the depopulation of the city) isn’t yet in place. There could be a solution, but the hardest part of making it happen will be changing the governance of Venice, its lagoon and the surrounding terraferma.
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Watch our animated short on climate crisis.
Venetian water levels, algae belts… and Canaletto?
7pm, Thursday 8 July
Professor Dario Camuffo will explore his use of Canaletto’s paintings as a proxy method to study the changes of sea levels in Venice.
What can eighteenth-century paintings tell us about modern-day Venice? What information can be extracted from past depictions of the city in order to understand its present? In this 45 minute fascinating talk Professor Dario Camuffo will explore how Canaletto paintings have contributed to the study of the changes to the average sea level in Venice since the 1700s.
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Inspired by Precious and Rare: Islamic Metalwork from The Courtauld don’t miss
Dr Sussan Babaie, Professor of the Arts of Iran and Islam at The Courtauld for an online talk,
7pm Thursday 24 June
Join Dr Sussan Babaie, Professor of the Arts of Iran and Islam at The Courtauld, to discover what is ‘Islamic’ in Islamic Arts, in addition to a discussion on the touring exhibition ‘Precious and Rare: Islamic Metalwork from The Courtauld’, which is on at the Holburne Museum until 1 August.
The talk highlights The Courtauld’s world-class collection of thirteenth- to sixteenth-century Islamic metalwork from modern-day Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey, including the Metalwork Bag, an exceptionally rare object made in Mosul (present-day northern Iraq) in around 1300–1330 that is the only surviving object of its kind.
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