Risky Business: Art Dealers & Exhibitions in the Inter-War Period

Wednesday 5 April 2023 at 2.00 pm at the Lowther Pavilion.  Guests may attend the lecture – £10 pp (pay on door)

The lecture notes leaflet can be downloaded/printed here

Evelyn Silber

Educated at the Universities of Cambridge and Pennsylvania, Evelyn Silber has worked at Birmingham Museums and Art Galleries, and from 1995-2001 she was Director of Leeds Museums and Galleries; from 2001-6 she was Director of the Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery, University of Glasgow. Evelyn is the author of books on Jacob Epstein and Gaudier-Brzeska. She has lectured for societies, universities and museums in Britain and the USA, and was a former Chair of the Charles Rennie Mackintosh Society. Evelyn has also lectured for ADFAS in Australia and The Arts Society in New Zealand in 2014. She also advises and leads cultural tours in and around Glasgow.

George Bernard Shaw during his early spell as an art critic, advised an artist friend, ‘Unless you can say, “This is the very thing for your splendid dining room” you have no chance.’ That is why it is more important to dine out than to study painting.  Only a handful of bold London dealers in the pre-1945 period persisted. Picasso’s first one man show in London was a commercial disaster though that of Matisse in the same gallery had a been a huge success. This talk abounds in incidents of outrage, hilarity and adventurous collecting.

Caption: Portrait of Picasso, by Juan Gris, at Google Cultural Institute maximum zoom level; Public Domain