Some of the most iconic images of the 20th century were created, not for galleries or private patrons, but for record sleeves. The zebra crossing immortalised on the cover of the Beatles’ Abbey Road is the site of a pilgrimage for people traveling thousands of miles to recreate this famous scene. Album covers have been adorned by Andy Warhol, Peter Blake, Salvador Dali, Richard Hamilton and a host of lesser-known artists and designers. We will explore the art of the album cover and reveal the close connections between visual and musical creativity in this vibrant period of popular culture.

The popular and not inaccurate view of the Vikings is of thuggish invaders and ferocious fighters. Whilst it’s always acknowledged that they were also masters of navigation and sea-faring and were great traders, not much attention is paid to their culture and how some of it influenced later church art in Britain. Their religious beliefs worked seamlessly with their legends so sometimes the two are hard to separate. Sagas tell of heroic deeds by both man and monster, whilst others unintentionally show the nuts and bolts of Scandinavian society.

This is a Christmas-themed lecture about snow in art history. Do you remember that childhood feeling of enchantment on the morning after a night of snowfall? At that age you probably weren’t worried about freezing pipes and congested motorways but experiencing an inimitable thrill as deep and pure as the snow itself. Art history has a lot to tell us about that feeling, and the many other emotions that snow provokes. In European art, snow arrived relatively recently, with Bruegel’s The Hunters in the Snow (1565) the first serious, large-scale consideration of the white stuff – snow’s joyousness, terror, and spirituality.