Research Visit to Bradgate Park, Leicestershire

Yesterday, we rehearsed in the Theatre at Chatsworth for the public performance on Sunday, September 25, 2016. This was fitted out as a Victorian Theatre in 1896; the 8th Duke commissioning William Hemsley, a leading London designer and supplier of ‘theatrical scenery and appliances’, to fit the room out as a theatre, with a permanent stage, stage equipment, a painted proscenium and front drop curtain, and a number of sets. Most of these remain, making them extremely rare surviving examples of

I have started re-devising and re-writing two performance texts for the Art Out Loud Festival in September. We have been at Chatsworth this week, and I have been focusing on research related to particular artefacts from across six rooms in the House, considering the landscape of House and Garden in relation to Eleonora di Toledo and Bess of Hardwick. It has been simply fascinating at so many levels, creating new challenges for the re-devising process of two new site-specific spaces, their

As promised, if you would like to read Brianna Pohl’s Blog ‘Infusing the Present with the Past through Art: Interview with Alison Oddey’, which I did for the Medici Dynasty Company in Florence last month, then go to: http://medicidynasty.com/interview-with-alison-oddey/

I was absolutely delighted to be the first speaker of Fashion Focus, which is new at the Costume Society Conference, 2016, and concerned with the very latest progress in research across the different disciplines of fashion, design and conservation. I was selected from many applications by a juried panel and was thrilled to learn in January this year that I had been chosen. The speaker can talk about any stage of the research process and my paper, ‘Fashion/Costume/Dress: Performing Women’, given

The shocking news came in the early hours of this morning that the UK has voted to leave the European Union. It is hard to comprehend what this will really mean for us, as a country. The implications of this decision are enormous, and the Prime Minister, David Cameron has resigned. It is impossible to imagine what this change will bring for the UK…. I am going to Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire today to research Bess of Hardwick, who never visited Europe, as far as I am aware, as a result of being

I am just back from a research trip to Florence and Pisa in Italy, where I am Visiting Professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. I was invited to give a Keynote at the Academy, which included an audience of postgraduate students focusing on Design for Museum Spaces, Art Installations, the Performing Arts, Scenography & Multimedia Installations. The title of the Keynote was ‘The Cultural Value of the Arts for Health and Well-Being’ and there were many challenging questions raised. It was

Last week, I attended the  6th Euroacademia International Conference, ‘Europe Inside-Out: Europe and Europeanness Exposed to Plural Observers’ in Nice, on the Côte d'Azur, France, where I presented a paper, ‘The Threads of a Life Well Lived: Beyond the Portrait’ as part of a panel on Art, History and Identity Making Practices in Europe: Visual Readings of the Past Signifiers. What uplifted me most was the beautiful sunshine and warmth of weather; just feeling the sun on my face and staring out

On Monday evening, May 9, 2016, Dame Vivienne Westwood, OBE, fashion legend & activist came to Derby Theatre and spoke passionately about climate change and social responsibility. Whilst promoting her Climate Revolution campaign, she invited members of the audience to “be intellectual”, to read books, to read novels, to go to Art Galleries, and look at paintings in books if they couldn’t visit a Gallery. She told the audience of over 450 that, “Education is about helping people discover their

Yesterday, April 23, 2016, the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s death was celebrated worldwide. In fact, there is no record of Shakespeare’s death, only his funeral in 1616. He was born in 1564, two years after Eleonora di Toledo’s death and funeral in 1562. Garments and fashion accessories were prominent in many of Shakespeare’s plays, in a time of laws regulating the types of fabrics and garments worn across society, known as the sumptuary laws. On Friday, April 22, 2016, I gave a