Our March 2027 Study Day will be held at Nayland Village Hall, Church Lane, Nayland CO6 4JH, 11.00am - 3.00pm (coffee is served from 10.30am). There is a car park at the hall, and behind the hall on the meadow. The cost is £38 per person, which includes morning coffee and lunch. The booking form can be downloaded here.
During the 19th century, when many Central European countries were still under the control of the Habsburgs in Vienna, art and culture were often the only ways in which the Empire’s constituent crownlands could express national identity. Just over a hundred years after the end of Habsburg dominance in Central Europe, this special interest day looks at three case studies, the Czech lands, Slovenia and Hungary, through the prism of their capital cities.
Lecture 1: The Magic of Prague: the City and the Czech Cultural Revival
As part of the Habsburg Empire, Prague was beloved of kings and princes. During the 19th century, however, the Czechs sought to reclaim the city. Tapping their roots and mythology, the Czech people imagined a new future through art, entirely reshaping cultural movements including Romanticism and symbolism in specifically patriotic ways. This contextual talk looks at painters such as Alfons Mucha, Otakar Lebeda and Jakub Schikaneder and composers like Bedřich Smetana and Antonín Dvořák, as well as their forward-thinking literary and architectural contemporaries, to show how the Czechs reclaimed both country and capital by cultural means.
Lecture 2: Ljubljana and Slovene Singularity
Situated between the Austrian Alps and the Balkans, Slovenia was subject to opposing political forces during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Crucially, however, many of its cultural figures sought to express an individual brand of nationalism. Artists such as Rihard Jakopič and Ivan Grohar formulated a local type of impressionism, celebrating the Slovene landscape, while architects Jože Plečnik and Ivan Vurnik reimagined the country’s capital, Ljubljana, creating one of the most unified urban design projects in Central Europe. This talk looks at their efforts within the context of the history of Slovenia.
Lecture 3: A Hungarian Metropolis
Budapest was formed in 1873 by the unification of Buda and Pest, situated on either side of the Danube. The new capital was the focus of resurgent Hungarian nationalism, which found expression through lavish new buildings, the continent’s first underground railway system and myriad paintings featuring specifically Hungarian subjects and locales. Meanwhile, in the countryside, composers Bartók and Kodály began collecting the songs and dances of their compatriots. Placing these endeavours in a historical framework, this final lecture explores how Hungarians came to understand their national identity through culture.
A writer and broadcaster, Gavin Plumley appears on BBC Radio 3 and 4, and contributes to newspapers, magazines and opera and concert programmes worldwide. He lectures widely about the culture of Central Europe. Recent appearances include Klimt and The Kiss in cinemas worldwide, and talks for the Hay and Cheltenham Literature Festivals, the Royal Opera House, the National Gallery, the National Trust, the National Theatre, the British Museum and the V&A. His first book, A Home for All Seasons, was published in 2022; his second, The Gay Apocalypse: Queer Life and Culture in Vienna 1900 will be released in 2027.