Special Events

Public engagement workshop in partnership with Manchester Metropolitan University

Saturday, January 12th 2019, 10am-6.30pm

Please note that this event is being held in Manchester (at the Manchester Metropolitan University Business School, BS 4.06 and G35, Manchester M15 6BH)

Full details of the event and booking arrangements.

 

Thessaloniki, a Metro-polis through the centuries

ICS and the British School at Athens Lecture

28 November 2018 at 5pm
Room 349, Senate House

Polyxeni Adam-Veleni, Director General of Antiquities, Hellenic Ministry of Culture & Sports

Thessaloniki

photograph by Orestis Kourakis

During excavations of the Metropolitan Railway in modern Thessaloniki, significant antiquities were discovered on the site of seven new stations. These include a previous unknown town, the Roman-period cemetery of a rich village, and many burials in the eastern and western necropolis of ancient Thessaloniki. Excavations in two stations, in the heart of the ancient and modern city, have revealed the central marble avenue (the “decumanus maximus”) and the vertical streets (the “cardines”), two huge ellipsoid squares, and in addition shops, luxury residences and public buildings. Together these discoveries transform our understanding of ancient Thessaloniki from antiquity to the Byzantine Empire. 

Dr Polyxeni Adam-Veleni, Archaeologist/Theatrologist was Director of the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki from 2006 to 2018 and director of the Thessaloniki Ephorate of Antiquities since 2017-18. She is Professor at the Greek Open University and International Hellenic University, visiting professor at universities in Europe and the US. She has conducted numerous excavations in Central and Western Macedonia (Hellas), organized or participated in more than 145 museum exhibitions, has published 155 papers in journals, 8 monographs and has edited 70 publications. Since July 2018 she has been Director General of Antiquities and Cultural Heritage of Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sport. Along with archaeology she deals with theatre, literature and painting.

 

Weaving Women's Stories (Being Human Festival 2018)

16-17 November 2018
St Margaret's House, Old Ford Road, Bethnal Green, London E2 9PL

Woman weaving

Full details of the series of events and booking arrangements.

 

Brecht and Greek tragedy: radicalism, traditionalism, eristics

T.B.L. Webster Lecture

14 November 2018 at 5pm
The Court Room, Senate House

Martin Revermann, University of Toronto

Brecht illustration

Brecht always considered Greek tragedy, and the kind of drama which in his perception Greek tragedy so prominently exemplified, as deeply problematic, politically naive and artistically flawed. These radical eristics of reception, so to speak, are in stark contrast to the philhellenism which traditionally informs responses to Greek tragedy. Brecht nonetheless very much needed Greek tragedy, and Tragedy in general, as an art form to engage with polemically, and the relationship between the two can be described as both dialogical and dialectical: without Greek tragedy as a target and an anti-model to work against Brechtian drama would lack a vital means of creating its own artistic autonomy and uniqueness.
This lecture will discuss key moments of Brecht’s complex and often stimulatingly idiosyncratic engagement with Greek tragedy: his 1948-adaptation of Sophocles’ 'Antigone' (Brecht’s play, his production in Chur/Switzerland and the subsequent ‘model book’), his theoretical treatise 'Small Organon for the Theatre' as well as what I call ‘functional equivalences’ (like the use of masks, the nature of chronotopes, the use of choruses, closural techniques or the representation of divinity).

 

Ancient Magic

31 October 2018, 6pm - 8pm
Beveridge Hall, Senate House

Medea

Since ancient times humans have used magic to curse and protect, to harm and heal, to divine and constrain. Join us to explore the mystical objects and potent rituals of our magical past in this free Hallowe’en event. Expert talks from academics and an author will be followed by the opportunity to participate in a range of hands-on activities exploring ancient magic – from making your own curse tablets and poppets to divining the future and turning humans into beasts.

Further information and booking details