Have you even felt like this woman at the end of the year? The label for this artwork is one of my favourites I’ve read in 2018 …
Wouldn’t it be marvellous to spend Christmas in the Rotunda Museum? This week’s object is a part of the building – a splendid spiral staircase in the central space, where the treasures of this Victorian collection …
Arabic is a diverse and beautiful language and ought to be represented more in museums and galleries as a living, breathing language, rather than simply as a religious script. The text at the bottom of this poster reads …
There’s sometimes an expectation that everything that appears in a book is ‘correct’. But mistakes get into printed books all the time. Even in libraries. Spot the typo in the top-left corner of this catalogue of…
The barely decipherable handwriting on this letter belongs to Charlotte Marsh, a suffragette imprisoned in Winson Green Prison, Birmingham in 1909. In it she gives the first written account of force-feeding …
This week marks the feast day of St Andrew (30 November) and it’s a public holiday in Scotland. The image on the left isn’t what you’d perhaps immediately associate with Scottish …
These two objects, placed side by side, are a marvellous example of text-free interpretation. Presented with two examples of matching floral wallpaper, together they tell a visual story …
At first glimpse you might think this is a 17th-century flower painting. But closer inspection reveals it’s a photo montage of a load of old rubbish. The artist collected trash …
Happy bonfire night. Instead of marking it with the usual British clichés of Guy Fawkes and gunpowder, I’ve opted for this German pooch, used for firework displays in the 1800s …
When I saw these objects on the wall in a naval museum in Istanbul, a while back, I was intrigued as to what they were. Closer inspection reveals they are, in fact …
21 October 1805. The sea battle is raging. 27 British vessels are taking on the combined French and Spanish fleet of 33 ships off the south-west coast of Spain …
Imagine the original girl power team, plastered across your bedroom wall. John Wilman Ltd did just that, as they made this wallpaper for the home in the late 1990s …
This idyllic scene of a shepherd, surrounded by animals and plants living in harmony, has obvious signs of a less than tranquil history. During the 1975-1991 Lebanese Civil War …
What do you see when you look at this portrait? Is it Diana, or is it someone else? Like the Mona Lisa, I can’t figure out if she’s smiling, or not …
These large slabs were made from a mould cast directly from carvings at the Palace of Persepolis, central Iran, in the 1890s. Rather than removing large sections of …
British Prime Minister David Lloyd George drew this doodle on a blotter pad at the Palace of Versailles, during the armistice negotiations at the end of the First World War …
Ballet was part of the high drama of the Cold War, as the US and the Soviet Union jockeyed for both political and cultural authority. The Soviet Union produced …
Despite the status of people who are arriving at this event, it seems to me that the new parliament building, the massed troops and even the flags are all more important to the artist …
One of the deadliest and most destructive volcanic events in recorded history took place on this day in 1883. The eruption had huge climactic results – the colour of the sky was affected …
The human face is perhaps one of the most replicated images in western art – so much so that Museums Sheffield have made an entire exhibition about it. Heads Roll, curated by …
The huts where British codebreakers worked during the Second World War aren’t much to look at from the outside. And inside isn’t much more impressive. Just huts, really …
On 10 August 1628 Vasa, the most powerful warship in the Baltic was launched in Stockholm. As cheering crowds looked on, this huge ship, unbalanced by its ballast, capsized and sank …
Happy National Day to Switzerland (1 August). The Swiss landscape inspired Michael Sibley, a modern British artist, whose oil painting of the snow falling on the village …
We’ve all seen a footprint in wet concrete, set into the pavement for posterity. The Roman who made this clay tile probably didn’t expect a dog to run over it as it was drying …
Who is in charge in this sculpture? Is the hero actually leading the bull to its ceremonial death, or is the beast in charge, perhaps sensing what is it come from the axe …
Between 1940 and 1944, the annual Bastille Day (14 July) military parade to mark France’s national holiday wasn’t able to take place in Paris …
When Charles Thackray had his surname printed onto this medicine jar around 100 years ago, he probably didn’t think it would end up being the name of a major museum …
