A SERIES of free monthly talks on the First World War and the impact it had on art and literature will continue in March with an event looking at the life of JB Priestley.

The Bradford-born author, whose life virtually spanned the 20th century, was one of England’s best-loved literary figures, whose Second World War broadcasts are said to have rivalled Churchill’s for audience numbers. In Priestley’s Wars the Ilkey-based writer and historian Neil Hanson traces the writer’s personal odyssey from his initial volunteering for the Front, to his post-war transformation that would make him one of the most influential voices for peace and disarmament. The event will take place from 6pm to 7pm on March 17.

A controversial war memorial will be discussed on April 21 from 6pm to 7pm. In 1923, papers as far afield as Glasgow and Norfolk carried news of the memorial being installed in the University of Leeds, depicting Christ Driving the Moneychangers from the Temple. In Art and Commemoration - An Uneasy Relationship: Eric Gill’s The Moneychangers in Context, Anne C Brook discusses the commission.

Rounding off the programme from 6pm to 7pm on May 12, is a talk by Juliet MacDonald, who is the Leverhulme Artist in Residence at the University of Leeds. In From the Shelves: Contemporary Art and the First World War Archive, she enthuses about her explorations of the Liddle Collection at the Brotherton Library, an internationally-recognised collection of diaries, letters, official documents, sketchbooks and other items of personal significance regarding the First World War.

Councillor Lucinda Yeadon, Leeds City Council’s executive member for digital and creative technologies, culture and skills, said: “Leeds Museums and Galleries have put together a wide ranging and diverse programme of activities and events relating to the First World War, and it is fantastic that we are providing this series of talks with our partner, Legacies of War at the University of Leeds. Held at Leeds Art Gallery the series investigates the fascinating and sometimes complex relationship between art and the conflict.”

Dr Claudia Sternberg, Legacies of War strand leader at the University of Leeds, said: “After starting out with a broader view of British art and war, we want to make connections between the global and the local as well as between the past and the present.”

She added: “Leeds Arts Club was a highly influential centre for modernist thinking in the 1910s. The Liddle Collection, an important WWI archive for historians, not only contains artwork by those who lived through the war, but also inspires new work.”