Use BBC.com or the new BBC App to listen to BBC podcasts, Radio 4 and the World Service outside the UK.

Find out how to listen to other BBC stations

Episode details

Radio 4,05 Apr 2017,30 mins

David Vann, Terence Davies, Albert Moore

Front Row

Available for over a year

David Vann is an Alaskan novelist with a love of the sea and boats. He talks about his latest novel Bright Air Black, which is a visceral retelling of the Medea Myth, imagining her journey across the Black Sea with Jason as they flee with the stolen Golden Fleece. Film director Terence Davies discusses him latest film, A Quiet Passion, about the American poet Emily Dickinson. He reveals how a passion for her poetry became a fascination with her life, and how the more he discovered about her - her withdrawal from life and her spiritual quest to make sense of religion - the more he empathised with her. A 19th century son of York - the artist Albert Moore - is the subject of a new exhibition at York Art Gallery which makes the argument that Moore is a forefather of British abstract art. Moore, known for his detailed paintings of women draped in classical robes, never achieved the kind of fame and prosperity enjoyed by his friends such as Whistler who described him as "the greatest artist that, in the century, England might have cared for and called her own". Professor Elizabeth Prettejohn explains why Moore matters. Presenter: Kirsty Lang Producer: Jack Soper.

Programme Website
More episodes