In a brilliant narrative that vividly evokes the personalities who populate and drive this story―including Aubrey Beardsley, Damien Hirst, and Barbara Hepworth―author Michael Bird reevaluates how we look at the history of modern Britain.

This is the story of how the lives of British artists, from the late-nineteenth century to the present day, reflected and refracted the profound changes and historical events in the wider world. This work chronicles her extraordinary life from the tragic accident that left her lame at the age of 14 to the writing of her novel from her death bed. In This is Tomorrow Michael Bird takes a fresh look at the ‘long twentieth century’, from the closing years of Queen Victoria’s reign to the turn of the millennium, through the lens of the artists who lived and worked in this ever-changing Britain. Among new letters to have come to light, a good many date from the years 1898-1922, which has necessitated a revised edition of Volume One, taking account of approximately two hundred newly discovered items of correspondence. A compelling and lively history that examines the lives of British artists from the late-19th century to today.Bird illuminates how British artists have been remembered, reimagined, and reshaped by a century of dramatic events. A timely update of the story of British art, packed with contextual material and photographs … Mr Bird gives voice to artists previously sidelined in such historical overviews: Sir Frank Bowling, Lubaina Himid, Mary Kelly, John Latham, Phyllida Barlow…. Volume Two covers the early years of his editorship of The Criterion (the periodical that Eliot launched with Lady Rothermere’s backing in 1922), publication of The Hollow Menand the course of Eliot’s thinking about poetry and poetics after The Waste Land. The book is lavishly illustrated with reproductions of many of Churchill’s paintings, some of them appearing for the first time. In This is Tomorrow Michael Bird takes a fresh look at the 'long twentieth century', from the closing years of Queen Victoria's reign to the turn of the millennium, through the lens of the artists who lived and worked in this ever-changing Britain.

In This is Tomorrow Michael Bird takes a fresh look at the ‘long twentieth century’, from the closing years of Queen Victoria’s reign to the turn of the millennium, through the lens of the artists who lived and worked in this ever-changing Britain. This is a compelling and lively history that examines the lives of British artists from the late-19th century to today. In war and peace, Churchill came to enjoy painting as his primary means of relaxation from the strain of public affairs.We will process the personal data you have supplied in accordance with our privacy policy (available on request).

These are the ebbs and flows that Michael Bird teases out in this panoramic account of Britain and its artists in across the twentieth century. His subjects included his family homes at Blenheim and Chartwell, evocative coastal scenes on the French Riviera, and many sun-drenched depictions of Marrakesh in Morocco, as well as still life pictures and an extraordinarily revealing self-portrait, painted during a particularly troubled time in his life.

Hilariously funny, sometimes rather sad, but invariably interesting, this is a superbly diverting book.

An enjoyable book, one which will entertain and inform even those who consider themselves well versed in this country’s art history. At the heart of this original book are the successive waves of displacement caused by global wars and persecution that conversely brought fresh ideas and new points of view to the British Isles; educational reforms opened new routes for young people from working-class backgrounds; movements of social change enabled the emergence of female artists and artists of colour; and the emergence of the mass media shaped modern modes of communication and culture. Meet Monsieur Benoit, who appeared suddenly in Paris with a scheme for telegraphing messages across the world (or, at least, across the room) by means of electricity and the telepathic power of snails, and actually raised the money to build this extraordinary machine.From the American James McNeill Whistler's defence of his new kind of modern art against the British art establishment in the latter half of the 19th century to the Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson's melting icebergs in London, he traverses the lives of the artists that have recorded, questioned and defined our times.