Sir Norman Rosenthal

The musical concerts mentioned at the end of the interview can be explored through this link. Below are two examples of concerts and Sir Norman Rosenthal's biography is beneath that. Norman Rosenthal was born in Cambridge, UK, in 1944, the son of Paul Rosenthal and Kaethe Zucker, who came to England in 1941 and 1939 respectively. He was educated at Westminster City Grammar School and the University of Leicester, where he graduated in 1966 with a degree in history. He undertook postgraduate studies at the School of Slavonic and Eastern Studies, as well as the Free University of Berlin. Norman Rosenthal organised his first exhibition in 1965 Artists in Cornwall at the Leicester Museum and Art Gallery in connection with the University Arts Festival. Since that time his professional career took him to Thomas Agnew & Sons, the well known firm of London art dealers, as librarian and researcher from 1966 – 1970; Brighton Museum and Art Gallery as exhibition officer from 1970 – 1971; Artist’s Market, a non-profit making gallery in Covent Garden, as organiser; from 1973 to 1976 director of European art exhibitions at The Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, responsible for two festivals, one in 1974 devoted to contemporary German culture, which inter alia brought Joseph Beuys to London for the first time, where he made his famous blackboard environment Richtkräfte, now belonging to the Nationalgalerie Berlin. The other, in 1975, was devoted to contemporary Greek culture, which brought inter alia Jannis Kounellis to London. From 1977 –December 2007 Norman Rosenthal was Exhibitions Secretary of the Royal Academy of Arts, London, where he enabled and organised all loan exhibitions, including Robert Motherwell 1978; Post Impressionism 1979-1980; A New Spirit in Painting 1981; Painting in Naples 1981;  David Hockney: A Drawing Retrospective 1995; Sensation 1997; Joseph Beuys: The Secret Block for a Secret Person in Ireland 1999; Georg Baselitz 2007; and many more. Many of the above exhibitions were organised in conjunction with major museums, largely in Europe and in North America. Norman Rosenthal has been particularly associated with a series of exhibitions at the Royal Academy documenting the art of the 20th Century, including German art in the Twentieth Century 1985; British Art in the Twentieth Century 1987; Italian Art in the Twentieth Century 1989; Pop Art 1991; American Art in the Twentieth Century 1993. At the Martin Gropius-Bau, the leading exhibition venue in Berlin, Norman Rosenthal was jointly responsible for two ground-breaking exhibitions of contemporary art: Zeitgeist in 1982 and Metropolis 1991, as well as The Age of Modernism- Art in the 20th Century, 1997. In 2005 Norman Rosenthal was curator of the exhibition From Luther to the Bauhaus – National Treasures from Germany, for the Konferenz National Kultureinrichtungen [KNK], in collaboration with the Kunst – und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland [KAH], Bonn. Appointments and awards include: 1985-2000 Member of the Board of the Palazzo Grassi, Venice 1987 Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Art, London 1988 Chevalier de l’Ordre de Arts et Lettres of the French Republic 1989 Cavaliere Ufficiale of the Italian Republic 1993 Bundesverdienstkreuz of the Federal Republic of Germany 1994-1998 Opera Advisory Board, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden 2002-2012 Appointed to Board of Trustees, Thyssen Bornemisza Foundation, Madrid 2003 Officier de l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres of the French Republic 2003 Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters [D,