Brian Eno & Bette A.

Brian Eno and Bette A. - What Art Does

Why do we need art? What Art Does is an invitation to explore this vital question. It is a chance to understand how art is made by all of us. How it creates communities, opens our worlds, and can transform us. Curious and playful, richly illustrated, full of ideas and life, it is an inspiring call to imagine a different future.

Brian Eno is an artist. He was born in Suffolk and studied art at Ipswich and Winchester art colleges. After art school, he joined the band Roxy Music and over the next five decades, he continued to make music with others including Talking Heads, Devo, U2, Laurie Anderson, James, David Byrne, Coldplay, David Bowie, Grace Jones, Jon Hassell, Harold Budd and Fred Again. Brian’s visual art has been shown internationally in over 200 venues. He is involved in activist work, such as the climate charity Earth Percent and HardArt, both of which he co-founded, and Stop The War coalition. Brian often lectures, trying to answer the question: What does art do?

Bette A. is an artist, born in Amsterdam. As a child she liked to write plays and her primary school teachers allowed her to practise them in the gymnasium. She studied Image and Language at the Rietveld Art Academy of Amsterdam. After doing a Master in Creative Writing at Oxford University she started writing in both English and Dutch and published her novels Rus Like Everyone Else and What’s Mine. Aside from writing novels, Bette makes short stories and drawings and teaches in art schools. In 2019 Bette co-founded TRQSE , a network of artists and scientists who work together on social projects.