This Cultural Life

Pioneering artist Liliane Lijn talks to John Wilson about her formative cultural influences. A leading figure in the development of kinetic sculptures in the 1960s, she is renowned for her use of light and movement, creating sculptures and installations that draw inspiration from quantum physics and astronomy. She has worked with scientists at the CERN nuclear research laboratory and the Space Science Laboratory at Berkely Universi...

Bestselling Turkish-British novelist Elif Shafak talks to John Wilson about her formative cultural influences. Renowned for epic stories that connect the past and the present, told from multiple perspectives, her novels explore marginalised communities and exiled people. An activist who has campaigned for the rights of women and freedom of expression, she faced prosecution in Turkey in 2006, accused for ‘insulting Turkishness...

American photographer Joel Meyerowitz talks to John Wilson about his cultural influences and formative experiences. A pioneer of the artform, he first began capturing life on the streets of his native New York in the early 1960s, and helped to establish colour photography as a fine-art medium. After travelling throughout Europe he made his name with a groundbreaking show at the Museum of Modern Art in 1968. Following the attacks on...

Actor Ray Winstone talks to John Wilson about his formative cultural influences and inspirations. A schoolboy boxing champion, he built a reputation playing tough, working class characters after being cast in the borstal drama Scum at the age of 17. Winstone won huge acclaim for his performance as an alcoholic abusive husband in the film Nil By Mouth, directed by Gary Oldman, and Jonathan Glazer’s Sexy Beast in which he playe...

Theatre and film director Sir Nicholas Hytner talks to John Wilson about his formative cultural influences. Over a career spanning four decades, he has directed Shakespeare, contemporary drama and musicals, including Miss Saigon which ran for over a decade in London and on Broadway. He served as artistic director of the National Theatre for 12 years, overseeing more massive box office hits including The Curious Incident Of The Dog ...

One of the world’s greatest living pianists, Mitsuko Uchida, talks to John Wilson about her cultural influences and her career in music. Born in Japan, and a British citizen for over 25 years, she is renowned for her interpretations of work by Schubert, Mozart and Beethoven, and for the intellectual rigour of her approach to musical manuscripts.

She has won two Grammy Awards, three Gramophone Awards, the Praemium Imperiale,...

Author Sebastian Faulks talks to John Wilson about his influences and formative cultural experiences. Faulks won huge acclaim for his First World War novel Birdsong, which – along with The Girl At the Lion D’or and Charlotte Gray – forms part of a trilogy of historical novels set in France. Since it was first published in 1993 Birdsong has gone on to sell more than three million copies worldwide and is taught in s...

Cuban performance and conceptual artist Tania Bruguera talks to John Wilson about her career and cultural influences. Her work explores freedom of speech, political oppression and social justice, often encouraging her audiences to become active participants in her performances, blurring the boundaries between art and viewer. Bruguera has exhibited at international museums including MOMA and the Guggenheim in New York, and at Tate...

The artist and sculptor Sir Anish Kapoor talks to John Wilson about his career and cultural influences. Renowned for his innovative, often monumental works, Kapoor gained international recognition in the late 1980s. He represented Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1990 and won the Turner Prize the following year. His public artworks include Cloud Gate in Chicago, the Orbit sculpture next to the London Arena, commissioned to mark th...

The writer Frank Cottrell-Boyce talks to John Wilson about his cultural influences and career. He started out as a screenwriter on the television soaps Brookside and Coronation Street, before publishing his debut children's novel Millions in 2004. The book won the prestigious Carnegie Medal and a screenplay version was made into a film by Danny Boyle. He also wrote five films for the director Michael Winterbottom, including Welcome...

John Wilson talks to the actor and musician Kiefer Sutherland. The son of Canadian actors Donald Sutherland and Shirley Douglas, he first made his mark in the 1980s and 90s with films including Stand by Me, The Lost Boys, Flatliners and A Few Good Men. His television portrayal of federal agent Jack Bauer in the crime series 24 became his signature role and earned him major awards, including an Emmy and a Golden Globe. He later st...

Australian-born artist, filmmaker and speculative architect Liam Young discusses his work and cultural influences with John Wilson. Young creates imaginary future worlds through films and art installations to provoke discussion about present-day social and environmental issues – including climate change, energy, migration, and technology. His films, including Planet City and The Great Endeavour, have been shown at the Venice...

Award-winning actor Kristin Scott Thomas talks to John Wilson about her career and cultural influences. After a breakthrough role in the Evelyn Waugh film adaptation of A Handful Of Dust, she became a global star with Four Weddings and a Funeral in 1994. Two years later, was Oscar nominated for The English Patient directed by Anthony Minghella. Her screen roles in the years since have included Gosford Park, The Horse Whisperer and ...

The Booker Prize winning American author George Saunders talks to John Wilson about his cultural influences. He made his name as a writer of satirical or absurdist short stories which often explore contemporary consumerist society, always underpinned with a strong sense of human compassion and empathy. In 2017, his first full length novel Lincoln In The Bardo - about Presidential grief amid a cacophony of spiritual voices - won the...

The soprano Dame Felicity Lott talks to John Wilson about her distinguished career and cultural influences. One of Britain's best-loved sopranos, her breakthrough role was as a last minute stand-in for Pamina in The Magic Flute in 1975. Over the next four decades, she built an international career, performing at opera houses and concert halls around the world, singing works by composers including Richard Strauss, Schubert and Mozar...

Over a seven-decade career, Michael Frayn has been acclaimed as a novelist, playwright, journalist, translator & memoirist. From his comedies – including the stage farce Noises Off, and a screenplay for Clockwise starring John Cleese, and the novels Headlong and Skios – to the complex political, historical and scientific themes of his stage plays Democracy and Copenhagen, he has been prolific in a diverse array of g...

Turner Prize-winning Artist Lubaina Himid talks to John Wilson about her formative influences. She made her name in the mid-1980s as a pioneering member of the British black arts movement, organising exhibitions to champion the work of fellow women artists. Having trained as a theatre designer, her paintings and installation pieces often have a strong narrative aspect, telling stories of race, history and identity. In 2017, at the ...

Theatre director and writer Robert Icke talks to John Wilson about his formative creative influences. Described by Variety magazine as ‘the great hope of British theatre’ and with his radical new versions of classic plays, Icke has built a reputation for revelatory productions. Born in Stockton on Tees in 1986, he made his name in 2015 with an epic new version of the Greek tragedy Oresteia, which he had adapted himself....

Booker Prize-winning author David Szalay talks to John Wilson about his creative influences. His 2009 debut novel London and The South East, based on his experience of working in telesales, won the Betty Trask Award. The author of six books, his work often defies easy classification: his 2016 novel All That Man Is comprises nine standalone short stories which share the overarching theme of masculinity. His 2018 novel Turbulence fol...