Why radio is a surprisingly good medium for talking about art

You might think it a fool’s errand to attempt programmes about art on the wireless. How can you talk about pictures or sculptures or any other visual form without being able to see them? But features on artists and their work can have a surprising resonance on radio precisely because without any images the programme-makers and their listeners are forced to work harder, and to look beyond the canvas to the back story, the purpose of a self-portrait, a seascape, a domestic interior. You could say that’s why the great film Mr Turner lacks a certain meaning. The visuals are stunning but the dialogue disappoints. At the same time radio itself has always been a picture-inducing medium, creating still lifes in the mind

In The Still Life Poet, which goes out on Monday on Radio 4, the Scottish Makar Liz Lochhead portrays the last years of William Soutar, who for 13 years was confined to bed, crippled and in pain.