Artist Lubaina Himid RA discusses how art can bring insight into hidden narratives in this special event.

Lubaina Himid RA

Photo: Magda Stawarska

This event can be enjoyed in person at the Benjamin West Lecture Theatre, or via a digital livestream.

As part of a series of six special talks by artists and architects, Lubaina Himid will discuss the role of the artist and how they develop conversations with audiences.

Lubaina Himid CBE RA is a painter and curator who has dedicated her 40-year career to uncovering marginalised and silenced histories, figures, and cultural expressions. Working across painting, drawing, collage, print and installation, Himid encourages personal encounters with her artworks as well as reflecting on the connections to 18th and 19th-century British art, culture and society. She has exhibited widely across the UK and internationally, including a recent major monographic exhibition at Tate Modern, and was the winner of the Turner Prize in 2017.

This special lecture is part of our Artists on Art series, a set of six lectures by leading artists and architects, exploring art-making, art education and creativity today. 2023 marks the 300th anniversary of the birth of Sir Joshua Reynolds, the Royal Academy’s first president, who lectured on the role of artists and art education at the RA Schools in his ground-breaking Discourses on Art.

Since our foundation over 250 years ago the Royal Academy has been a place for artists, where art is taught, made and shaped. Inspired by the questions Reynolds first posed, Artists on Art addresses what it means to be an artist in the 21st century.

The event will be accompanied by speech to text transcription courtesy of Stagetext.