From Dionysos to Dawkins

Broadcaster and journalist Joan Bakewell presents radio and television programmes as diverse as Sky Arts' Portrait Artist of the Year to Radio 4’s Inside the Ethics Committee. She also appears BBC2’s The Daily Politics Show, Radio 4’s Saturday Live, Classic FM and LBC Radio. For many years she presented the Radio 3 series Belief. Joan has now presented two series of Portrait Artist of the Year and will also be presenting the forthcoming Landscape Artist of the Year, both for Sky Arts. She has also presented a number of Panorama programmes for BBC1, including Our Dirty Nation, Old, Drunk and Disorderly? and The Generation Game, in which she explored the challenges ahead in caring for an ageing population. Joan also presented a recent BBC Radio 4 documentary on Dementia, Suppose I Lose It. Joan presented two series for Classic FM, Joan Bakewell's Lovers which explored the love lives of classical music's great composers and performers. Joan’s particular areas of interest are the arts, religion, and old age. She was BBC television’s arts correspondent throughout the 80s, and was later on the board of the National Theatre, The Aldeburgh Festival, and Friends of the Tate. She is currently Chair of the theatre company Shared Experience and also of The National Campaign for the Arts.

In the 90s Joan presented Heart of the Matter on BBC 1 – a programme that dealt with moral and religious dilemmas of our times. Joan has written five books including She’s Leaving Home, All The Nice Girls, The View From Here: Life at Seventy, Belief and The Centre of the Bed.

She writes for various national broadsheets including The Guardian, The Independent and The Telegraph.

She was the government appointed ‘Voice of Older People’ between 2008 and 2010.

Joan tweets as @jdbakewell