In Other Words

The man credited with reinventing the museum and changing British culture, Sir Nicholas Serota joins us for a special extended episode of In Other Words. Now Chair of Arts Council England, Serota was the director of Tate for 28 years. More than anybody else, he helped shift attitudes in Britain, making the country more comfortable with contemporary art while he oversaw the growth of Tate both physically and in terms of reputation and ambition. Once a small institution, Tate became a phenomenon and the best attended museum of Modern art in the world. Serota began his career in the 1980s during a period in which the country’s politics were isolationist and there was a “certain paranoia about continental Europe and artists from Europe”. By the early 2000s, the country had become more international and open, and the arts were flourishing as London established itself as a creative and economic hub. Recorded on the day of a historic defeat in the government’s “meaningful vote” on Brexit, Serota discusses the curren