Front Row

To mark the 75th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki this week, the Imperial War Museum commissioned artist and stage designer Es Devlin and her Japanese collaborator Machiko Weston to make a short film in memory of those who died. They discuss their resulting artwork, I Saw the World End.New Perspectives, the Midlands company that takes theatre to rural areas and usually performs in village halls, has come up with a novel idea. For its latest production created during lockdown it has embraced old technology: 'Love from Cleethorpes' is a drama told on postcards. Every few days a new postcard arrives at the homes of the audience and, over a couple of weeks, the story unfolds. Tom Sutcliffe is joined by New Perspectives artistic director Jack McNamara. Literary critic Suzi Feay and arts journalist Kohinoor Sahota review Ali Smith's new novel Summer, the final instalment in her seasonal quartet of books, and discuss arts stories from the week including I'm a Celebrity moving from the Australian jungle to a British castle and Vogue theming their September issue on activism.The final guest for the Front Row Lockdown Discoveries, where artists and creators select something cultural that has given them pleasure or inspiration in the dark months of isolation, is Alys Tomlinson, Photographer of the Year at the 2018 Sony World Photography Awards. She describes her discovery – zoom portraiture. Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe Producer: Timothy Prosser

Arts organisations in the West Midlands say the region is one of the worst hit by the Coronavirus pandemic. In Birmingham, despite emergency relief funding from the Arts Council, the Town Hall and Symphony Hall face cutting half of their workforce, while both the Birmingham Repertory Theatre and the Hippodrome have announced substantial job losses. What impact does it have on a city when its cultural centres are forced to close their doors? Over 20 British playwrights and poets have been commissioned by Pitlochry Festival Theatre to write A Love Letter to Scotland, inspired by the River Tay. The works written as part of its three-year Shades of Tay project, will be shown online as audio dramas, podcasts and short films. Douglas Maxwell and Chinonyerem Odimba are two of the playwrights taking part in the project.All this week on Front Row, individuals from the arts are choosing one Lockdown Discovery, a cultural find that has given them pleasure during the dark months of being stuck at home due to Covid-19. Today alto-saxophonist and MC Soweto Kinch explains how running and cycling along the canals of Birmingham has sparked a creative love affair with the canals and decaying backwaters of his home city.The emergence of quarantine or quara-horror, with a frankly terrifying new film set on a Zoom call. Host was filmed over twelve weeks in quarantine entirely on Zoom.Presenter: Katie Popperwell Producer: Cecile WrightMain image: The River Tay

Front Row is featuring interviews with all the shortlisted authors for this year's Women's Prize for Fiction. Tonight, Maggie O'Farrell, whose novel Hamnet is about the son of William Shakespeare who died aged 11, an event thought to be the inspiration for Hamlet. In her novel, Maggie O’Farrell imagines the family life and tragedy of one of our greatest playwrights, about whom so little is known.Group singing has been severely affected by government advice on restricting the spread of Coronavirus as inhaling microscopic droplets expelled by fellow singers is a high risk activity. But choirs serve functions beyond singing together. We speak to Katherine Dienes Williams, Master of The Choristers at Guildford Cathedral and to Martin Trotman, director of The Wellbeing Choirs which aim to promote and maintain good mental and physical health through singing.This week we’ve been hearing from artists and creators who’ve been telling us about their Lockdown Discoveries, a cultural find that has given them pleasure in the dark months of isolation. Today crime writer Mark Billingham reveals his unexpected rediscovery…jigsaws!Presenter: Kirsty Lang Producer: Sarah Johnson

Qatari-American artist, writer, and filmmaker Sophia Al-Maria discusses her screenplay for the latest big release from Sky Atlantic. Inspired by Anaïs Nin’s collection of erotic stories, Little Birds is set in the famous 'international zone' of Tangier. New York heiress Lucy Savage (Juno Temple) is fresh off the transatlantic steamer and ready for love and marriage in exotic climes. But when her husband Hugo (Hugh Skinner) does not receive her in the way she expected, she spins off into a new surprising, diverse and sexually liberated world.Poet Laureate Simon Armitage responds to today's decision by Ofqual, the exams regulator, that students taking English Literature GCSE next year will not be required to study any poetry. They will be assessed on a Shakespeare play, but have the option to cover a 19th century novel or a post-1914 work of British fiction or drama, or poetry. This summer, many of us are holidaying at home so rather than recommending books to take on holiday, tonight we're recommending books about holidays or set in holiday locations. Clare Allfree, books editor at The Metro Newspaper, guides us through her selection of vacation-themed literature.All this week on Front Row, creative individuals from the arts are choosing one Lockdown Discovery, a cultural find that gave them pleasure in the dark months being stuck at home. Today it’s the turn of the architect Tara Gbolade, whose lockdown was significantly improved by accidentally stumbling upon a book which captured her architectural imagination: Vernacular Architecture of West Africa: A World in Dwelling.Presenter Tom Sutcliffe Producer Simon Richardson

Barbara Kingsolver talks about her new book, How to Fly (In Ten Thousand Easy Lessons) which is only her second collection of poetry. As well as offering practical advice (on knitting, getting divorced, doing nothing) the poems are about family, and making peace with life and death. Barbara also reflects on the redemptive power of art and poetry itself and celebrates the natural world whilst mourning its desecration.All this week on Front Row, creative individuals from the arts are choosing one Lockdown Discovery, a cultural find that has given them pleasure in the dark months of Covid-19. We start today with production designer Es Devlin, who tells us about her discovery - The Tempest by Creation Theatre. Sculptor Thomas J Price will unveil his statue Reaching Out this Wednesday. Depicting an anonymous everywoman absorbed in silent communication, the statue stands at 9 feet tall and will be one of only three public sculptures of Black women in the whole of the UK. Norman Lebrecht discusses the extraordinary career of the American concert pianist Leon Fleisher, who has just died at the age of 92. Fleisher lost the use of his right hand and performed left-handed for several decades, before regaining the ability to play with both hands later in life. Presenter : Kirsty Lang Producer : Julian May Production Co-ordinator : Hilary BuchananMain image: Barbara Kingsolver Image credit: Steven L. Hopp

Film director Alan Parker is remembered by Dick Clements and Ian La Frenais, who wrote The Commitments.Disney Producer Don Hahn (Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King) joins Samira Ahmed to discuss his new documentary about the legendary lyricist Howard Ashman, who wrote Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid and part of Aladdin, before dying of Aids in 1991 at the age of forty, before Beauty and the Beast was released. Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, writers of comedy classics such as The Likely Lads and Porridge pay tribute to their colleague, the Bafta-winning director and producer Sydney Lotterby, who has died aged 93. In a long career, which he put down to luck, Lotterby made Porridge, Last Of The Summer Wine, Yes Minister, Butterflies, May To December and Open All Hours.The producer and founder of Black Ticket Project Tobi Kyeremateng and award winning crime writer Denise Mina join Samira Ahmed to review some of the week's most striking works - Prodigal Son starring Michael Sheen in a Silence of the Lambs style television drama series and Beyonce’s visual ablum Black is King, released today. Denise, Tobi and Samira also give choices of their own.Natasha Trethewey has twice been the US poet laureate. She talks to Samira Ahmed about her new book Memorial Drive, a prose memoir about growing up the daughter of a white father and a black mother. That marriage, when she was born in 1966, was illegal in Mississippi. It foundered and Natasha moved away with her mother who married a black Vietnam veteran. He battered her mother and, when Natasha was 19 and away at college, shot her dead.Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: Jerome Weatherald

Derry Girls creator Lisa McGee discusses her new TV series - psychological thriller, The Deceived. In the drama, inspired by Hitchcock’s Rebecca, Dial M for Murder and other classic films of that time, a student falls for her married tutor and after a shocking death finds herself doubting her own mind.Sculptor Heather Phillipson on putting whipped cream and a cherry on Trafalagar Square’s Fourth Plinth. This morning she unveiled her sculpture, The End - a giant swirl of cream, a cherry, a fly, and a drone that transmits a live feed of the square. It is the thirteenth commission for The Fourth Plinth since the programme began in 1998, and it is also the tallest to date - measuring 9.4m and weighing nine tonnes. The artist joins Kirsty to discuss her vast physical and digital sculpture.Avni Doshi’s debut novel Burnt Sugar has just been longlisted for the Booker Prize, two days before it’s UK publication date. Avni discusses her work about a fractious mother-daughter relationship, set in and around Pune in India – in an ashram, a club, and the streets. Presenter: Kirsty Lang Producer: Emma Wallace

In the run-up to the announcement of the winner of the 2020 Women’s Prize for Fiction on the 9th of September, Front Row will be hearing from each of the six novelists on this year’s shortlist. We begin today with Hilary Mantel, whose novel The Mirror and the Light is the conclusion of her wildly acclaimed Thomas Cromwell series, which began with Wolf Hall in 2009. Ai Wei Wei’s latest work has opened to the public. The Chinese-born, Europe-based artist has created a piece for London’s Imperial War Museum which takes over the entire floorspace of the atrium, depicting The History of Bombs We heard this morning that theatres will have to wait until November to be told whey can re-open without social distancing. That will be too late to plan the lucrative pantomime season. We talk to Julian Bird of UK Theatre about what this means.Electronic at the Design Museum. Design Museum director Tim Marlow on recreating the thumping atmosphere of a nightclub for their new exhibition about electronic music, from Kraftwerk to The Chemical Brothers

Shawanda Corbett, a ceramic artist and performer whose performances combine dance with music, prose and poetry, is the latest in our series of interviews with artists awarded a £10,000 Tate bursary in place of this year's Turner Prize. She was born with one arm and without legs and has developed a unique throwing technique in order to make pottery. Shawanda bases her vessels on people, referenced journeys out of slavery on the Underground Railroad as well as her own personal history of rehabilitation. Literary critics Sarah Shaffi and Toby Lichtig dissect the longlist of the 2020 Booker Prize. For the full list see below. Writer-director Claire Oakley discusses her acclaimed debut feature film Make Up, a coming-of-age psycho-sexual thriller set in a Cornish caravan park.And we salute Peter Green, guitarist and founder member of Fleetwood Mac, who died on Saturday. He wrote some of the most memorable melodies and riffs of the late '60s and '70s, including the evocative instrumental, Albatross.Presenter Samira Ahmed Producer Julian May

Nigerian British writer Irenosen Okojie has been announced as the winner of this year’s £10,000 Caine Prize for African Writing. It was awarded for her story Grace Jones from her recent collection Nudibranch. We speak to her about the story.Kit de Waal discusses Supporting Cast, her new collection of short stories featuring characters from two of her earlier novels - the international bestseller My Name is Leon and The Trick to Time.Shirley Collins is regarded by many as England’s greatest living traditional folk singer. She was a pivotal figure in the English folk song revival of the 60’s and ’70’s but lost her voice to a broken heart and fell silent for 38 years. In 2016, in her eighties, she returned to music with her album Lodestar, and now discusses her latest release - Heart’s Ease. Star of Hollywood's Golden Age Olivia de Havilland has died aged 104. Cultural historian Matthew Sweet celebrates her indomitable spirit, as a person as well as a performer. Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe Producer: Hannah Robins