Who Needs Critics?

Matthew Sweet questions the critic's role while Vid Simoniti looks at algorithms and art.

• 44 mins

Novelist Tahmima Anam, plus was Nero a ruthless tyrant?

Was Nero really a victim of plots? Bulgaria's hidden past. And a novel about startups.

• 44 mins

Fashion, Art and the Body

Olivia Laing, Charlie Porter and Ekow Eshun join Shahidha Bari.

• 44 mins

Wittgenstein's Tractatus at 100

Can you solve all the problems of philosophy in one book? Shahidha Bari and guests debate.

• 44 mins

The Botanical Past

From paintings to the gardens of Kew, how a new plant collecting history is being written.

• 44 mins

Alice and Dreaming

Salman Rushdie is one of Matthew Sweet's guests for a conversation about the imagination.

• 44 mins

Can Artists Help Save the Planet?

From ice photos by Wayne Binitie to 140 ideas from artists collated by Hans Ulrich Obrist

• 44 mins

Women's Art

Jennifer Higgie, Adjoa Osei, Veronica Ryan, and Lydia Yee talk to Shahidha Bari.

• 44 mins

Beryl Vertue

Matthew Sweet meets the Sherlock producer and ex-agent of Tony Hancock who has turned 90.

• 44 mins

How anthropology helps us understand the world

Economist Gillian Tett is one of Anne McElvoy's guests.

• 44 mins

Nadifa Mohamed, Gentle/Radical, Dylan Thomas

The work of Turner prize nominees, a Tiger Bay murder story, Under Milk Wood on stage.

• 44 mins

Displacement

Edmund de Waal and Frances Stonor Saunders discuss uncovering Jewish family stories.

• 44 mins

Masks

The role of masks in African traditions, Greek tragedy and Covid conspiracies

• 44 mins

Building London

Eric Parry and Alison Brooks; writers Fiona Mozley and SI Martin and pianist Belle Chen.

• 44 mins

Mid Century Modern

Shahidha Bari and guests look at labour saving devices and revamping the 1950s home.

• 44 mins

World's Fairs and the Future

Owen Hatherley, Emily MacGregor and Paul Greenhalgh go back to the future.

• 44 mins

Cornwall and Coastal Gothic

From crumbling tin mine towers to second homes: Laurence Scott on art, fiction and film.

• 44 mins

The Innovative Shape of Poems

Sandeep Parmar talks to poets Kayo Chingonyi, Paisley Rekdal and Dr Nasser Hussain.

• 44 mins

Glenda Jackson on filming Sunday Bloody Sunday

Matthew Sweet and guests including Glenda Jackson on John Schlesinger's love triangle film

• 44 mins

The English country house party

Why does the grand country house party hold such power over the English imagination?

• 44 mins

Epic Iran, Lost Cities and Proust

Rana Mitter and guests explore the art and culture of Iran, and why people abandon cities.

• 44 mins

Mining, Coal and DH Lawrence

Matthew Sweet looks at the connections between the arts and coal mining communities.

• 44 mins

Breathe

Writer James Nestor, musician Soweto Kinch, Forensic Architecture's Imani Jacqueline Brown

• 44 mins

Alain Robbe-Grillet

Guests including author Tom McCarthy join Matthew Sweet to discuss the French 'new novel'.

• 44 mins

Connecting with Nature

Music from thunder, art inspired by a dog walk; essays about a city wood and a rural field

• 44 mins

Bette Davis

As the BFI prepares a season of films, Matthew Sweet and guests discuss the Hollywood star

• 44 mins

Dante's Visions

Art historian Martin Kemp and painter Emma Safe, parallels with Proust and a Dante website

• 44 mins

The Glitch

Novelist Tom McCarthy joins Matthew Sweet to explore glitches and what they tell us.

• 44 mins

Belonging

A teacher's view, a Frankenstein-inspired ballet, outsider status and circus paintings.

• 44 mins

Hannah Arendt's exploration of totalitarianism

Why do Hannah Arendt's ideas continue to fire the imaginations of artists and thinkers?

• 44 mins