Bit of art history, bit museumy … what more could you want from an opening ceremony?

I dreamt last night that I had to write up my PhD and the panic I felt at the sheer number of words I had to produce. THANK GOD I don't have to do that again! 😌

❄️ Today's #OnlineArtExchange is winter sports ⛷️🛷 Here are ten Winter Olympic sports in art 👉 https://artuk.org/discover/stories/athletes-on-ice-ten-winter-olympic-sports-in-art#OnlineArtExchange 'Jane Torvill and Christopher Dean' by Charles J. B. Dodd (1913–1984) © the artist's estate. 📷 Gedling Borough Council

OBVS! www.ipswichstar.co.uk/news/2582055...

It’s the definition of driech outside today.

Just submitted my second Chinese assignment. Had to write a passage of text in characters and then record myself speaking it out loud. Flipping stressful! But it’s done. About a third of the way through the module now.

People often say that their least favourite word is "moist" (which I've always thought is a kind of a social media-driven contagion rather than a genuine thing) – but anyway, it might help those people if they interpolate an "A", e.g.

British Library placement profiles include illustrated & illuminated incunabula, Elgar's letters, law & legal studies, UK newsletter publishing, war poetry, digital sustainability, decarbonisation and more. Deadline 27 February. #Skystorians

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

NEWS: C20 is delighted that Norwich Sports Village, the only concrete shell structures in the UK designed by pioneering Swiss engineer Heinz Isler, has been Grade II listed. The graceful, tent-like canopies are only 10mm thick and a masterpiece of engineering. ➡️ c20society.org.uk/news/heinz-i...

New on the blog- it is 10 years since @bethlemmuseum.bsky.social was shortlisted for @artfund.bsky.social Museum of the Year and in my new blog I return to one of the most interesting museums in the UK. tinctureofmuseum.wordpress.com/2026/01/25/k...

my favourite attendee of the London Art Fair yesterday was the girl - I want to say maybe nine years old? - who ran like the wind towards one specific booth, stopped dead, got paralysed by giggles for a solid minute, then got her phone out and took a very zoomed in picture of a painting of a butt

'New [British Academy-funded] research shows that visits to prison museums and other dark heritage sites are shaped less by labels, displays or audio guides, and more by how people experience them together.'

'Over the past decade, a series of discoveries on Sulawesi has overturned the old idea that art and abstract thinking in our species burst suddenly into life in Ice Age Europe and spread from there.'

We're delighted to announce the publication of Issue 12 of OAJ, 'Picturing bodies in medieval and early modern Europe,' edited by Andrew Murray and Margit Thøfner. openartsjournal.org/issue-12-pic...

From delicate design to big, bold splashes, Colour Shape Pattern celebrates it all. Come and explore: ipswich.cimuseums.org.uk/colour-shape-pattern

How are things in general?

A propos, well, everything these days

It'll just make you very, very depressed.

these are important

Event: 'Votes for Women in Halifax and West Yorkshire' sslh.org.uk/2026/01/15/v...

Because it's nothing to be ashamed of, this is me disclosing that my mental health has recently been dire and as a consequence, my meds have been increased. I'm hopeful that will get me back on an even keel soon. As the saying goes, 'If you can't make your own serotonin, store bought is fine'.

Today at 1345 on Radio 4 (or available now online), I'm talking to @naomialderman.bsky.social about Leonardo da Vinci.

if you really want to feel wonderful, spending a bit of time with the brain of Leonardo Da Vinci is the way it is interesting. seeking out brand new people is *also* delightful but you'll get a long way in life by going: sad? listen to Bach, look at Leonardo's notebooks/sketches, read Jane Austen

If you happen to be near a radio (or BBC Sounds) this lunchtime, the episode of the OU/BBC Co-production 'Human Intelligence,' for which I was the nominated academic, will be broadcast on Radio 4 at 1.45pm. www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

I’m on leave and culling my 15 year collection of Art History journals. Hoping the local Oxfam bookshop will take them! Looking forward to all the extra shelf space.

There’s a #ghostsign on the wall of a new part of the EastEnders set! (At the entrance of the alley where Jasmine met Chrissie in the car at the start of Part 1 this evening.)

Chrimbo arts and crafts (for the cat’s benefit!)

Well, this is some positive news!

Some Georgian-era sparkle from the Thames this week. A startling cobalt blue paste gemstone, impossible to miss this pop of colour among the beige, brown & grey of the foreshore at low tide. Likely to have been lost from an 18th century gent’s cufflink. The Georgians adored their bling #mudlark

As an academic, what do you do when you literally have no more research ideas?

'AI is coming' I tell the museum stakeholders as I proudly cut the ribbon of our new Artificial Insemination exhibition

Just submitted my claim (www.anthropiccopyrightsettlement.com?utm_medium=L...). I doubt anything will come of it but you never know. A few extra pennies might be nice!

This was meant to be a reply to @jackshoulder.bsky.social 🙄🤦🏻‍♀️

Happened the night before the start of the MA conference which was actually at St Fagans. Horrible coincidence!

"Art history gives you tools to interpret the visual world and makes you more of a critical viewer of political messages, advertising and a barrage of social media images. It’s dangerous if you can’t examine these things critically". apollo-magazine.com/art-history-...

Yes. Also, why are they out and about if they actually have the flu?

I don’t want to hear anyone calling Suffolk a cultural backwater ever again!

I grew up in the 70s and 80s. If you weren't there, just a little clarification on that Spectator piece. Literally, NOBODY admired Hitler. Apart from nazis. Hope that helps.

“Museums, to me, conjure up an image of being sanitised, stuffy places that only middle-class and upward people go to.” Listen to episode 1 of Radical Museums season 3 now, where Sharon Heal travels to Belfast to meet with the ACT Initiative's William Mitchell: https://ow.ly/YyyA50XGeuM

In a workshop this morning that was repeatedly Zoom boomed. It’s like 2020 all over again! I really feel for the organisers. Hopefully fixed now! 🤞

Anyone else received an email about the class action against Anthropic?

Student awards day! How brilliant our students are! And how brilliant is the OU?!

And this demonstrates why visual literacy is so important!

Horror of horrors! I’ve run out of green tea! A sorry state of affairs. I think it might even warrant an emergency Tescos run!