BRADY LECTURE: NORMAN ROSENTHAL

About

We are pleased to present the ninth in our series of annual lectures named in honour of Philip Brady (1932 — 1997), Reader in German at Birkbeck College, London — an inspiring broadcaster, writer and lecturer. In 1996 he was awarded the Goethe Medal for his contribution to British-German exchange. This year's lecture will be delivered by Sir Norman Rosenthal, the renowned, flamboyant and sometimes controversial curator and former Exhibition Secretary of the Royal Academy, London. In his talk Norman Rosenthal will speak about how the three German artists Joseph Beuys, Georg Baselitz and Anselm Kiefer have affected his work. Norman Rosenthal was the child of Jewish refugees from Nazi-occupied Europe and grew up in London. After studying History at the University of Leicester he worked for the Institute of Contemporary Art in London. Then, in 1977, he was appointed Exhibitions Secretary at the Royal Academy of Arts. He remained in this position for over three decades and helped transform the Royal Academy into an internationally renowned exhibition space. Amongst other major exhibitions he curated the show A New Spirit in Painting (1981) that brought to the forefront work by Georg Baselitz and Anselm Kiefer. In addition to his work at the Royal Academy, Norman Rosenthal has curated shows at an international level. At the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin for example Norman Rosenthal, in collaboration with Christos M. Joachimides, was responsible for the ground-breaking exhibition Zeitgeist (1982), a major international group survey presenting the latest neo-expressionist paintings centred around a sprawling installation by Joseph Beuys. The team went on to curate Metropolis (1991), also known as Zweitgeist, in the same museum. Having left the Royal Academy in 2008 Norman Rosenthal continues to work as a special adviser to the Royal Academy planning new exhibitions. He also works as a freelance curator and writer in the UK and abroad. The purpose of the Brady Lecture is to foster German-British dialogue and develop cultural exchange. It is in this context that Norman Rosenthal will deliver a lecture on his experiences working with German artists and in Germany.