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28 January 2020The Art of Captain Cook's Voyages
25 February 2020Prague - The City of the Winter Queen
24 March 2020Deceiving the Eye - Trompe l'oeil Paintings
28 April 2020From Elizabeth to Elizabeth - Five Centuries of British Art
26 May 2020From Holbein to Byrd: Drawings, Paintings and Music
23 June 2020Passionate Potters - from De Morgan to Leach
28 July 2020A Passion for Victorian Wallpaper
22 September 2020Jane Austen: letters, life and lesser known works, with sketches and watercolours


The Art of Captain Cook's Voyages Prasannajit De Silva Tuesday 28 January 2020

Captain Cook’s fame largely rests on the three expeditions to the Pacific that he led in the 1760s and 1770s. In addition to their important role in the history of European exploration, they are notable for being the first such voyages to include professional artists among the crew. These artists played a critical role in recording the places visited and the people and flora and fauna encountered on the voyages. But how did they deal with the novel surroundings they encountered? And how did their work go on to shape European understanding of those settings?

Prasannajit De Silva completed his doctorate in 2007, researching the art of the British in India during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. His lecturing covers British visual culture of the eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries, including art produced in various colonial settings. He is particularly interested in the relationship of aspects of art, architecture, and design to their broader cultural, social, and political contexts, and also teaches courses on the methods and theoretical approaches of art history. His current work includes roles as Associate Lecturer at Birkbeck, University of London and Sessional Lecturer for the WEA.