The Fitzwilliam Museum Podcasts: Recent Episodes
Fitzwilliam Museum
The Fitzwilliam Museum Podcasts is a collection of miniseries exploring the Fitzwilliam Museum collection, work and research.
In this episode, artist Paul Scott discusses Cumbrian Blues Palestine Gaza, a ceramic plate recently acquired by the Fitzwilliam. This dessert plate once showed an idealized landscape of 19th-century Palestine, but Scott has overlaid this image with scenes of modern-day destruction in Gaza. Scott discusses the history of transferware pottery, and his efforts to reveal the hidden politics behind landscapes. This series is supported by the Charlotte Bonham-Carter Trust.
In preserving our pasts for the benefit of future generations, museums have always been forward looking. But what does the future, and the future of museums, look like? In this episode of What Are Museums For?, Fitzwilliam Museum Director Luke Syson and Athena Art Foundation Director Nicola Jennings are joined by Professor Rebecca Kilner and Esme Ward, to explore museums’ relationship to the environment, nature and science. What role have the arts historically played in shaping our ideas about the environment? How do museums help to bring scientific knowledge into the public sphere? How can museums promote sustainable values and become more sustainable themselves whilst nurturing a global audience? This podcast is a Fitzwilliam Museum, Colnaghi Foundation and Athena Art Foundation co-production.
In this episode, artist Aida Wilde discusses Dreamboat II, a tiny origami boat made from repurposed Syrian Banknotes. Dreamboat II was commissioned by The Fitzwilliam as part of its Currencies of Conflict and Exchange exhibition. Wilde discusses her desire to raise money and awareness for refugees, as well as her own experience as a survivor of political violence from Iran.
This series is supported by the Charlotte Bonham-Carter Trust.
Digital technologies are continually changing the way we engage with and relate to physical objects. In this episode of What Are Museums For?, Fitzwilliam Museum Director Luke Syson and Athena Art Foundation Director Nicola Jennings are joined by Alayo Akinkugbe, Dr Gus Casely-Hayford OBE and Daniel Pett, to discuss the current digital opportunities around museum collections and engagement. What role can virtual exhibitions play in connecting people to collections? How might digital and physical approaches be combined to generate new layers of meaning? How can social media help us to tell different stories and engage younger audiences? This podcast is a Fitzwilliam Museum, Colnaghi Foundation and Athena Art Foundation co-production.
Every object tells a story, and the stories of how objects ended up in museums can be fraught with political and moral complexity, and even violence. In this episode of What Are Museums For?, Fitzwilliam Museum Director Luke Syson and Athena Art Foundation Director Nicola Jennings are joined by Professor Nicholas Thomas and Dr Donna Yates, to consider questions of institutional and community authority in the context of historical collections. Why do debates – and actions – around restitution matter? What responsibility do collectors/collections have to investigate and respond to the histories of the objects in their care? How does the restitution of objects fit with a broader desire to understand all cultures in all parts of the world?
This podcast is a Fitzwilliam Museum, Colnaghi Foundation and Athena Art Foundation co-production.
In this episode, artist Reza Aramesh discusses, Action 125, a hyper-realistic polychrome sculpture acquired by The Fitzwilliam Museum and displayed alongside Berruguete's Saint Sebastian, made 500 years earlier. Aramesh discusses the detailed process behind this sculpture and how it asks the viewer to engage with themes of representation and the iconography of the subjugated body in the context of race, class and sexuality. This series is supported by the Charlotte Bonham-Carter Trust.
For many individuals and communities, the history of art has been a history of neglect, exclusivity and exclusion. In this episode of What Are Museums For?, Fitzwilliam Museum Director Luke Syson and Athena Art Foundation Director Nicola Jennings are joined by Rebecca Birrell, Jennifer Higgie and Dan Vo, to consider representation in the context of gender, sexuality and sexual politics. Have approaches to the acquisition and display of works by and documenting women and LGBTQ+ lives changed in recent years? How should museums deal with problematic histories and with objectifying or violent imagery from the past? What level of responsibility do museums have to ‘represent’ particular identities or communities?
This podcast is a Fitzwilliam Museum, Colnaghi Foundation and Athena Art Foundation co-production.
Dan Vo and Elvira Dyangani-Ose discuss First Flight (2015), a set of etchings by British figurative artist, Lynette Yiadom-Boakye (b. 1977), acquired by the Fitzwilliam Museum in 2020.
Lynette Yiadom-Boakye’s work challenges the restrictive, aggrandizing themes of the European portrait tradition by destabilising sitters’ identities and removing indications of place and time. Instead, her enigmatic, invented heads make room for multiple interpretations and projections.
Dan an Elvira discuss questions of representation and agency that are raised by Lynette Yiadom-Boakye’s work, particularly when placed it in dialogue with examples of portraiture, by Anthony van Dyck and Rembrandt van Rijn, from the Fitzwilliam Museum’s remarkable print collection.
There is increasing recognition that enslavement, racial violence and exploitation are an inextricable part of our collective histories. In this episode of What Are Museums For?, Fitzwilliam Museum Director Luke Syson and Athena Art Foundation Director Nicola Jennings are joined by Aindrea Emelife and John Orna-Ornstein, to consider museums’ responses to the legacies of enslavement and colonialism. How can we tell stories about them without repeating the violence and perpetuating racist hierarchies? How do we make space for multiple truths, complexity and contradiction? In the face of multiple truths, where does the authority of museums reside?
This podcast is a Fitzwilliam Museum, Colnaghi Foundation and Athena Art Foundation co-production.
New Art, New Perspectivesis a new series taking a closer look at The Fitzwilliam Museum's latest acquisitions and displays. These additions to the collection highlight artists of colour, showcase under-represented stories, and demonstrate the importance of contemporary art to historic collections.
Hosted by Dan Vo, each episode features an intimate conversation with artists and curators. Subscribe and stay tuned for Dan's conversations with artists Magdalene Odundo, Reza Aramesh, Aida Wilde, and Paul Scott as well as renowned curator Elvira Dyangani-Ose speaking about the work of Lynette Yiadom-Boakye.
This series is supported by the Charlotte Bonham-Carter Trust.
50 years ago, Magdalene Odundo came to Cambridge to study art and began a career in ceramics that would see her become one of the greatest living ceramists in the world. In this episode, Odundo sits down in her Surrey studio with host Dan Vo to discuss her new exhibition at The Fitzwilliam Museum and reflect on her philosophy of clay and making.
This is episode one of the New Art, New Perspectives series. This series is supported by the Charlotte Bonham-Carter Trust.
Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge will be on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum until the 24th of July, 2022. You can also explore the exhibition on the museum website: fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk.
Museums have traditionally played an important role in the forging of national identity. In this episode of What Are Museums For?, Fitzwilliam Museum Director Luke Syson and Athena Art Foundation Director Nicola Jennings are joined by Sussan Babaie and Gabriele Finaldi, to discuss the relationship between museums and nationhood. How do ideas about national identity impact collections and their presentation? How might we develop less Eurocentric and more inclusive approaches? What roles could or should museums play in imagining the future for our country?
This podcast is a Fitzwilliam Museum, Colnaghi Foundation and Athena Art Foundation co-production.
Listen to this audio clip to hear Magdalene Odundo DBE speak about her fellow student and friend, jeweller Charmian Harris.
Part of the exhibition, Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge between 5 October 2021 and 24 July 2022.
Listen to this audio clip to hear Magdalene Odundo DBE speak about a Kenyan cooking pot, on loan from the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge.
Part of the exhibition, _Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge_, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge between 5 October 2021 and 24 July 2022.
Listen to this audio clip to hear artist Magdalene Odundo DBE speak about her memories of Cambridge.
Part of the exhibition, _Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge_, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge between 5 October 2021 and 24 July 2022.
Listen to this audio clip to hear Magdalene Odundo DBE speak about her memories of visiting the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
Part of the exhibition, _Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge_, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge between 5 October 2021 and 24 July 2022.
Listen to this audio clip to hear Magdalene Odundo DBE speak about her memories of visiting Nigeria.
Part of the exhibition, Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge between 5 October 2021 and 24 July 2022.
Listen to this audio clip to hear Magdalene Odundo DBE speak about her memories of visiting The Fitzwilliam Museum, and the work of Thomas Toft.
Part of the exhibition, _Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge_, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge between 5 October 2021 and 24 July 2022.
Listen to this audio clip to hear Magdalene Odundo DBE speak about her own pots.
Part of the exhibition, _Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge_, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge between 5 October 2021 and 24 July 2022.
Listen to this audio clip to hear artist Magdalene Odundo DBE speak more about her teacher, Zoë Ellison.
Part of the exhibition, _Magdalene Odundo in Cambridge_, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge between 5 October 2021 and 24 July 2022.
Matt Smith’s lockdown adventure was spent in County Kilkenny. From there he recalls being in the Fitzwilliam’s Gallery 6, where decades old wall coverings reveal memories of where paintings have been. Effects of light and marks of use revealing the passage of time. This led Matt to an early photographic
process called cyanotypes, creating an image using just paper, light and two chemicals. Often used in the past to create flower prints, Matt’s mind turned to flower paintings by artist Rachel Ruysch (1664-1750) in Gallery 17. Hear how he makes a connection from Ruysch’s paintings to the decriminalization
of homosexuality.
Jackie Kay describes her discovery of Fanny Eaton as two time worlds coming together with modern technology providing the portal which brought this black Victorian into her house. Fanny was born in Jamaica in 1835, and the graphite drawing of her by Simeon Solomon feels very vivid to Jackie, as if “she is right there”. Discussing Fanny’s life leads Jackie to talk about how we need more black work in our galleries, paintings of black people or by black people who have been hidden from history, thoughts we hear developed in Jackie’s poem: “Fanny Eaton, the Pre-Raphaelite Jamaican Muse”
Issam’s memories of the Fitz are many but he is drawn to something from his birthplace Syria. His mind’s eye recalls three small eye idols, 5000 years old, from the ancient Syrian city Tell Brak. Issam asks “What is the future of my past”? He creates sculptures of the eye idols, like everyone’s family, watching what is happening in the world. He uses soap from Aleppo and carves while blindfolded. The
soap reminds us to wash our hands during our Covid crisis, but also that the world cannot wash its hands of all that is going on.
Halima Cassell’s “Virtues of Unity” was exhibited in our Things of Beauty Growing: British Studio Pottery exhibition in 2017-18. The Museum shop was where she discovered Clarence Bicknell’s designs on cards and wrapping paper. Although from different times and starting points both she and Bicknell were inspired by plant formations and the geometry and symmetry found in the natural world. She recognized the grid (or scaffolding as he called it) as just one of the techniques they shared: “I love symmetry and I love complex design made from a simple shape that is repeated”
Author, playwright, academic and journalist Ali Smith reads “Elegy in a Cup and Saucer”. She begins by asking us “Where have you been in your dreams in lockdown?” Her dream takes us through the Fitzwilliam’s galleries, pausing at paintings she has known since she first visited the Museum as a postgrad in 1985. Finally she reaches a “tiny, glowing and haunting painting” – White Cup and Saucer by Henri Fantin-Latour. Luke Syson, Director, then discusses the painting with Jane Munro, Keeper of Paintings, Drawings and Prints, who describes it as “…a painting that draws people in.”
In My Mind’s Eye is a new podcast series, which grew out of our national lockdown earlier in 2020. We invited 5 artists and writers, who had previously worked with us at the Fitzwilliam Museum, to think about what happens when we can no longer access artworks directly. How do these art works continue to exist, in our memories and imaginations? How do they influence the art we ourselves might make?
Ali Smith, Halima Cassell, Issam Kourbaj, Jackie Kay and Matt Smith took up the challenge and shared with us the artworks that they carried with them from the Fitz in their mind’s eye. In each podcast we learn about different experiences of lockdown in recordings which had to be done remotely to comply with Covid-19 regulations. We gain insight into creativity in isolation as we learn about the ideas and process behind their creative responses to the remembered artworks, which were the starting point for inspiration. The conversations with the artists and writers, and their recollections, share memories from the Scottish highlands to Pakistan. We find out about soap production in Aleppo, and how a 19th century drawing can be seen in the context of Black Lives Matter. As we approach a winter of growing restriction caused by the resurgence of Covid-19, we invite you to listen to In My Mind’s Eye: the museum explored.
The series was produced and presented by Carmen Pryce, with audio production by Nick Harris and was made possible by the support of the Belvedere Trust.