Rebecca Birrell | Venus, Vanishing
Sun 22 Nov 2026 | 10:00am - 11:00am
It is entirely fitting that acclaimed art historian and curator Rebecca Birrell’s first novel focuses on an artist building a new life – Rebecca curated the recent rehang of paintings in the Fitzwilliam Museum’s Galleries 1–5. Set in 1930s Germany, Rebecca describes Venus, Vanishing as ‘bearing witness to the slow then sudden collapse of a world of pleasure and freedom’. The art of her protagonist Hannah could be what secures her survival – or denies her any chance of escape. Come and discover this gripping and vivid novel.
In conversation with Emily Lawford.
Venue: Cambridge Union Library
Duration: 1 hour
Tickets available soon.
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Author Biography
Rebecca Birrell is an art historian and curator. She is a Bye-Fellow at Murray Edwards College, University of Cambridge. Her first book, This Dark Country: Women Artists, Still Life and Intimacy in the Early Twentieth Century, was shortlisted for the PEN Hessell-Tiltman Prize and awarded an Antonia Fraser Grant for a Biography in Progress by the Society of Authors. It was chosen as a Guardian/Observer Art Book of the Year. Venus, Vanishing is her first novel.
Chair Biography
Emily Lawford is the online editor at the New Statesman. She is an identical twin and is half American, which means she has four passports.
