lecture Archives - The Charterhouse

27th January 2022

Inside the London Charterhouse in the late Middle Ages

In the year that we are raising money to preserve our monastic buildings, we are pleased to announce that Professor Julian Luxford is giving our March online lecture, when he will be sharing his research about the buildings of the original London Charterhouse around 1500, illustrated with contemporary records – before it was repurposed as a Tudor mansion, and then a school and almshouse. Join Professor Luxford as he evokes the historically defining aspects of a site which, in spite of the worst efforts of Henry VIII (and the Second World War), has never stopped echoing its monasticism.

Julian Luxford is Professor of Art History at the University of St Andrews, where he has worked since 2004. One of his main scholarly interests is the medieval art and architecture of the Carthusian order, and he has published essays on some of the sculptural fragments in the Charterhouse’s museum and contributed to Revealing the Charterhouse, published in 2016. Book your place at the lecture here (with a donation if you can – very much appreciated). To find out more about our Charterhouse650 appeal click here.

18th March 2021

Cromwell, Bowes, the Goldsmiths and the Mint: recorded lecture

During the reign of Henry VIII a special three-way relationship existed between the royal jewel house, the mint and the Goldsmiths’ Company: the jewel house and the mint were both at the Tower of London. The jewel house was the repository of huge quantities of surplus royal plate and in times of need quantities of old plate would be trundled across the courtyard to the mint to be recycled into gold or silver coins. Each year the Goldsmiths’ Company was charged with checking (as it still is) that the newly minted coinage was of the correct alloy. Join author and expert in gold and silver Timothy Schroder as he takes a close look at the workings of this relationship and at the individuals who operated it: Thomas Cromwell, master of the jewel house and Martin Bowes, who was both master of the mint and an influential member of the Goldsmiths’ Company. Timothy Schroder is author of ‘A Marvel to Behold’, Gold and Silver at the Court of Henry VIII (Boydell, 2020) and past Prime Warden of the Goldsmiths’ Company.

Access your link to the lecture here (& a donation would be most welcome).

18th January 2021

The Charterhouse from Restoration to Revolution: recorded lecture

Our online lecture by Dr. Cathy Ross, Honorary Research Fellow at the Museum of London, and consultant to the Charterhouse, is now available as a recording to view online. In the lecture Cathy shares some of the new stories that have emerged from the Great Chamber project, and in particular its focus on the seventeenth-century governors whose portraits now hang in the room. Did the restoration of Charles II after the Civil War usher in a period of calm, or was the opposite true? The lecture will explore the ups and downs of Sutton’s Hospital and its governors during this remarkable and turbulent period.

Dr Cathy Ross’s museum career has focused on the challenges of representing the complexity of cities within a museum, and has published widely on museums, contemporary collecting and London history. Her books include Designing Utopia: John Hargrave and the Kibbo Kift (2015), London: The Illustrated History (2008), The Romance of Bethnal Green (2007), Twenties London: a City in the Jazz Age (2003).

Access your link to the lecture (with a donation if you can) here.

10th September 2020

As Good as Gold: online lecture

The story of gold and its significance and symbolism throughout the history of art. Gold as the colour of the sun: the colour of divinity; the colour of status and the colour of love. From creations ancient and contemporary, sacred and profane – all that glitters is most certainly gold… Join Alexandra Epps, Arts Society Lecturer and Art Guide to learn more at our October online Lecture.

Book your place at the Lecture with a donation here.

3rd August 2020

More and more – Law and the Charterhouse: recorded lecture

An opportunity to see the recording of Sir Mark Warby’s fascinating Lecture – ‘More and more – law & the Charterhouse’. High Court Judge, Sir Mark Warby presents his own compelling and illustrated insights into law and its development in UK and USA, and an array of its practitioners, some distinguished and some less so, and their connections with the Charterhouse over the centuries. His interest in the subject was first sparked in 2017 when he arrived at the Charterhouse as ‘consort’ to the Master, Ann Kenrick. Sir Thomas More is perhaps the most famous legal mind to be associated with the Charterhouse, but there are many others, as Sir Mark’s lecture will reveal.

Access the link here (and a donation would be very welcome).

3rd August 2020

Henry VIII and the Men Who Made Him: recorded lecture

An opportunity to watch our recent excellent live online Lecture by eminent historian and best selling author Tracy Borman as she shares insights from her research, and excerpts from her book Henry VIII and the Men who Made Him. Henry VIII is famous for his multiple marriages, but it was the men in his life who shaped this notorious monarch – and he, in turn, determined their fates. In this talk we are introduced to a dazzling cast of characters: some ‘mad’ (Sir Francis Bryan, the so-called ‘Vicar of Hell’), some ‘bad’ (the grasping minister Thomas Wolsey) – but none as ‘dangerous to know’ as Henry VIII himself.

Tracy Borman has extremely kindly agreed to give this lecture to help raise funds for the charity as it navigates very challenging times during the pandemic. (Ignore the dates above)

You can receive the link to the Lecture now with the option of paying a donation, here.

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