Save the date: Friday September 14th we will host a vernissage for Faces Of Exile, the travelling exhibit on men charged with same-sex infractions in Mussolini's Italy. With a roundtable featuring me, Patrizia Gentile, Alessio Ponzio, and Antonio Cazorla Sanchez.

Want to support mutual aid groups and unions at the forefront of relief efforts in Sudan and learn from the brilliant Robin DG Kelley? Here is your chance: Secure your spot now. August 20th, 6 pm. Sliding scale. Zoom. See link below. chuffed.org/project/work...

Thanks to @bsonblast.bsky.social for the great article suggestion: peacesos.nl/the-war-in-s... Straightforward breakdown of the war and who is benefiting

The war in Sudan is not a civil war. It is a business model. - Peace SOS

Once again, people are being killed in Sudan, and once again the Darfur region is at the centre of the violence. The war in Sudan is usually described as a civil war between two rival generals. That d...

peacesos.nl

What can photographs tell us about anti-racist activism in twentieth-century London? Julian Ehsan on recording community histories through the Bengali Photo Archive and the extraordinary work of Lloyd Gee.

Activism, Identity, and the Bengali Photo Archive

What can photographs tell us about anti-racist activism in twentieth-century London? Julian Ehsan on the Bengali Photo Archive.

historyworkshop.org.uk

Dangers of working from home: the recently cut hay field across from my house caught fire 20 mins ago - could see and hear flames as the breeze whipped it up to the village. Tinder dry even after a shower overnight. All safe - I hope including the birds and rabbits who were gleaning the stubble.

The first PhD for my new ERC funded project is now being advertised (the project begins in 2027). This one is practice based – I’m looking for an outstanding person with a masters degree. This is unfortunately only available to UK and Ireland students. See here: www.liverpool.ac.uk/courses/ai-a...

From Cesare Pavese’s diaries, published after his death (by suicide) as ‘Il Mestiere di Vivere’ - the craft of living. These lines were written in 1936, while he was internally exiled in Italy by the fascist regime. 🇮🇹 (photo shows carved stone slab with Italian quotation and yellow flowering plant)

Sally Hayden@sallyhayd.bsky.social · 4d ago

"What world lies beyond this sea I do not know, but every sea has another shore and I will arrive." - seen in a cemetery on Italian island Lampedusa, where people who die at sea are buried.

The photography studio founded by the Alinari brothers in Florence in the 1850s played a large part in shaping how the rest of the world came to see Italy. Today, writes Sophie Barling, the extraordinary archives the firm left behind are a testament to this technological and artistic revolution.

View-finding in Italy

Established in 1852 by three brothers, the Alinari firm produced many of the oldest photographs of Italy. Sophie Barling visits its vast archive in Florence

buff.ly

“How many massacres will it take in Sudan before France breaks its silence over the United Arab Emirates' support for the Rapid Support Forces ? “ says Human Rights Watch. www.hrw.org/news/2026/07...

France’s Troubling Silence on the UAE Role in Sudan

How many massacres will it take in Sudan before France breaks its silence over the United Arab Emirates' support for the Rapid Support Forces ? Three years after the start of the conflict between the ...

hrw.org

Sunset in the Umbrian Apennines.

The Sunday sweet pea harvest. #TinyJoys

Since the early days of photography, people have wanted to capture their pets on camera. (Read on to find out why we want to see yours!) These postcards collected by the artist Tom Phillips (1937–2022) are now held in the University of Oxford’s Bodleian Libraries.

And if you'd like to know more about fortune-telling in Ancient #Egypt, get yourself a copy of this book! 🏺🗃️ Ideally from an independent bookseller, or your local library – but it's also on A*@z@n, with loads of rave reviews to boot. 💙📚 #Egyptology

Ancient Egyptian Magic: A Hands-on Guide

In the ancient world the magicians of Egypt were considered the best. But was magic harmless fun, heartfelt hope, or something darker? Whether you needed a love charm, a chat with your dead wife, or t...

uk.bookshop.org

Greg Jenner (Historian)@gregjenner.bsky.social · last wk.

Ancient Egyptians worshipped a fortune-telling, sacred bull 🐂 A clip from our new episode of You’re Dead To Me about Pharaoh Akhenaten & his wife Queen Nefertiti, featuring Egyptologist Dr Campbell Price and comedian Sikisa Watch on BBC iPlayer or listen on BBC Sounds

Five years old today! 🥳🎂😻 Mitzi has only been with me since September, but her first family shared this pic when I adopted her - she hadn’t yet reached full fur. She needed rehoming when her owner went into end-of-life care. Clearly much loved since birth - all animals should be so lucky. 💙🐈🐈‍⬛ #cats

The new Prime Minister is writing a "10-year plan" for the UK. The arts & culture MUST be part of it. I've signed @campaignforthearts.org's petition urging @andyburnham.bsky.social to revitalise the arts – to revitalise the whole nation 🌱 Join me: www.campaignforthearts.org/petitions/10-year-plan/

Prime Minister – put the arts in your 10-year plan for the UK | Campaign for the Arts

Sign our petition urging the UK Government to build a country where the arts are available from childhood, accessible to all and thriving everywhere.

campaignforthearts.org

The Sudan Solidarity Collective is continuing to support mutual aid work in North Darfur and Kordofan and has recently started supported the tea vendors union as they rebuild their livelihoods. To support go to: www.sudansolidarity.com.

Mitzi is a firm believer that #Caturday should include everything AND the kitchen sink. 💙🐈🐈‍⬛ #cats

Down an Internet Archive rabbit hole (again): here, a beautiful 1909 book by Sir William Arrol & Co #Glasgow, featuring one of their own bridge projects in #Sudan. 🦋 doesn't seem to allow image and link, but book title is Bridges, Structural Steel Work, and Mechanical Engineering Productions. 🗃️📷

Getty Images has agreed to license its content to OpenAI. Emily Gould, assistant director of the Institute of Art and Law, considers what it means for the future of image libraries and the fair treatment of artists.

Why is the world’s largest image library partnering with OpenAI?

Getty Images has signed a display agreement with OpenAI, raising questions for the future of image libraries – and for the fair treatment of artists, writes Emily Gould

buff.ly

A surprising amount of my 'research' involves rotating gazillions of study photos taken in archives - chiefly of photograph albums. 🗃️📜📷📸 Also, kudos to whoever decided thick black marker reading 'KHARTOUM' would clear up any confusion about the identity of this one, from the Cleveland Bridge Co.

Working in partnership with the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, the Food Museum, the Glasgow Life Museum, the Hastings Museum & Art Gallery and the Museum of Free Derry, the Migration Museum (London) is seeking 10 Community Curators. Might this be you?

Migration Museum partners with museums and galleries to launch new UK-wide Community Curators programme

The Migration Museum is partnering with five museums and galleries across the UK to launch a new programme bringing diverse voices, lived experiences, and perspectives into the creation of a series of...

migrationmuseum.org

My #ArchiveHour today: Palace Green Library, Durham University, to consult yet more photograph albums from the #Sudan Archive. Bridges, railways, trans-imperial labour, and quite a few camels. Colonialism and the camera, again. 🗃️📜📷

All the cycling karma to the absolute gent who delayed his young family’s day out @beamishmuseum.bsky.social to help me get the chain back on my bike this morning. Bike people are some of the best people! 🙏🚲❤️📜

For #ArchiveHour: today I visited Teesside Archives in the Dorman Museum, Middlesbrough, built by steel magnate Sir Arthur Dorman (of Dorman Long) as a memorial to his son George, who died of illness in the South African War. Opened 1904, though the archives moved here only a few years ago. 📜🗃️

Sudan is one of many parts of the British Empire poorly remembered in popular history today, but it dominated late 19th-cent imperial imaginings. Upstairs at the same museum, Kordofan (a region of Sudan) is the name of this candle-holder designed by Christopher Dresser and sold by Liberty. 🗃️📜

Christina Riggs@christinajriggs.bsky.social · 2w ago

Cleveland Bridge Company of Darlington, of course (Dorman Long of Middlesbrough also built bridges in Sudan; both archives in the Dorman Museum). Here, a section of the Blue Nile Bridge ready to ship to Khartoum, as signs at the base explain. Photograph dated November 1907, Teesside Archives. 🗃️📜📷

Congratulations @lucyanne.bsky.social - wonderful news! 🥳🗃️

Durham History@durhamhistory.bsky.social · 2w ago

Congratulations to Lucy Jameson who has won the Singer Prize from the British Society for the History of Science for an essay based on a chapter of her PhD – ‘Pass the Parcel: Disabled Expertise, Prosthetics of Productivity, and Scientific Management in the British Post Office, 1918–1921’

My chapter “Archaeologies of Unfree Labour and Liberal Fantasies of Abolition” is out now in The Oxford Handbook of the Comparative Archaeology of Slavery, ed. by J Webster and M Leone. Proud to have led this piece, written with X Ayán Vila, R Bernbeck, H Burke, B Serrazina, C Smith, and C Westmont.

Durham University@durham.ac.uk · 2w ago

How can archaeology deepen our understanding of slavery's legacy? New research led by @ruigomescoelho.bsky.social from our Archaeology department explores how archaeology can help uncover the material traces of unfree labour across the modern world 👉 bit.ly/4fb9XaP

Cleveland Bridge Company of Darlington, of course (Dorman Long of Middlesbrough also built bridges in Sudan; both archives in the Dorman Museum). Here, a section of the Blue Nile Bridge ready to ship to Khartoum, as signs at the base explain. Photograph dated November 1907, Teesside Archives. 🗃️📜📷

Christina Riggs@christinajriggs.bsky.social · 2w ago

I’m in an archive! Which is in a museum! And has giant photos of giant bridges! Exciting. This is Goz Abu Goma bridge on the White Nile in #Sudan, built by the Cleveland Bridge Company, Middlesbrough - and a workforce including hundreds of Egyptians, Sudanese, West Africans, and Italians, too. 🗃️📜

I’m in an archive! Which is in a museum! And has giant photos of giant bridges! Exciting. This is Goz Abu Goma bridge on the White Nile in #Sudan, built by the Cleveland Bridge Company, Middlesbrough - and a workforce including hundreds of Egyptians, Sudanese, West Africans, and Italians, too. 🗃️📜

The book is out and available, in full open access with @degruyterbrill.bsky.social 🚨 Thank you to the @c2dh.uni.lu for the open access. 11 chapters about the public fabric of history in Europe. www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi... @ncph.bsky.social @ifphexplorers.bsky.social