Five year old is considerably less excited by a new dinosaur at the Natural History Museum than daddy is.

Artists: Come and help turn the museum's exhibition gallery into a whimsical, magical garden for kids! Details here: thackraymuseum.co.uk/about-us/wor...

Enjoyed @northernballet.bsky.social's witty, sexy, pleasingly Yorkshire production of Gentleman Jack (only partly because our current show also features a starring role for Anne Lister). Particularly liked how much of it was about books, words and writing, but conveyed through movement.

Exciting to see our big pile of poo dumped in the middle of this shortlist! 💩🥇

Our new exhibition is the first time I've curated something as a linear chronology. But a circuit round a room is not just a straight line, so I made sure we begin and end with the same image: one of the muscle men from Vesalius's 1543 Fabrica, showing up again in the 2001 New Atlas of Human Anatomy

I did refer to these as "post-mortem paper dolls" in our new exhibition. And, to shout out another great medical museum collection: Anyone who does want to have one of their own, Royal College of Physicians has some DIY craft instructions: history.rcp.ac.uk/sites/defaul...

(3/3) From this first overview of the situation for over 20 years, it’s clear that it’s time for DCMS to review its failed historic Guidance, and introduce regulation for the retention of human tissue in legacy colonial collections. Full story >> www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...

My Radio 4 appearance scoring very well with the "friends of my mum who live at the other end of the country and are unlikely to visit Leeds in the next 6 months" demographic. Whether it's actually encouraging people who live round here to visit time will tell.

Here me talking sexy corpses on Radio 4 Front Row. (Episode also features Bridgerton and tourism tax) Listen here: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

Nice positive review from the world of art history academia. globo.hypotheses.org/3244

Feature wall in our new exhibition: a huge blown up image of a dissection. It is the title page of Andreas Vesalius's hugely influential De Humani Corporis Fabrica and contains a whole manifesto on the future of anatomy in its richly symbolic imagery.

Pancake Day

“There are now more places to sell plasma than there are Costco stores [in the US] — and more are popping up in solidly middle-class neighborhoods”

As it's Valentine's Day: my favourite anatomical illustrations of hearts from the museum collection...

Leeds back-to-back housing, Cross Oswald St, 1970, photo by Nick Hedges.

When AI was added to a tool for sinus surgery: “Cerebrospinal fluid leaked from one patient’s nose. In another… a surgeon mistakenly punctured the base of a patient’s skull. In two other cases, patients suffered strokes after a major artery was accidentally injured” www.reuters.com/investigatio...

As people are posting their #SuperbOwl examples and the owl is the symbol of our fair city, here's an owl inkwell from the Thackray Museum collection. This one was hand carved by a patient at Meanwood Park Hospital

Opening today at Thackray Museum of Medicine! Beneath the Sheets: Anatomy, Art & Power A brand new exhibition about bodies and the people who reveal them.

'Spanning five centuries, the deceased in the anatomical prints currently on show in the exhibition Beneath the Sheets: Anatomy, Art and Power, at Thackray Museum of Medicine...none of them consented to images of their unclothed, mutilated bodies being bound up in a book or displayed on a wall.'

Enjoyed talking to BBC Culture about bodies, consent, sensuality, and how there's no such thing as objective illustrations of human anatomy. www.bbc.co.uk/culture/arti...

From London to Delhi, but especially Leeds. Nice to be featured in February's most anticipated new exhibitions worldwide.

Children's hospitals should be painted blue and candy pink, according to this 1970s book of colour theory. "Such a scheme is quiet enough for a sick room, but its tiny touches of clear colour would help to hold a convalescing child's interest, and counteract boredom."

Why did magic mushrooms evolve? We may finally have the answer www.newscientist.com/article/2512...

"You do that picture of the relative position of the superficial organs of the thorax and abdomen, Joe?" "Sure did boss, real fuckin sexy just like you asked." "what"

The Battle of Corunna took place #OTD in 1809. Civilian surgeon Charles Bell volunteered to treat wounded soldiers returning to Britain. He later created these artworks which he used for teaching. Some of these artworks can be seen in our Wohl Pathology Museum.

2024's You Choose was one of my favourite exhibitions to work on. It was big, ambitious and weird. And - as @claireturner.bsky.social and I discuss here - gave us more insight into our visitors' preoccupations, interests and worries than we've ever had before. thepolyphony.org/2026/01/12/y...

Claire Turner and Jack Gann explore questions of personalised medicine, digital technologies, and prevalent health concerns in the exhibition You Choose. thepolyphony.org/2026/01/12/y...

Weird take on Scarecrows Wedding, given virtually every shot is set against a backdrop of coastline and a lighthouse. I wouldn't find this irritating were the tone not "I know we're not really paying much attention but give us some credit". www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

Have progressed beyond "does my 5 year old genuinely believe Santa is real?" and onto "does my 5 year old genuinely believe all the complicated Santa lore that she herself has invented to be real?"

It's the most wonderful time of the year for a museum Victorian street scene. York Castle adopting a soundtrack of 19th century carols, while at Abbey House I was surprised to see the scene play out to Julia Jacklin's "Baby Jesus is Nobody's Baby Now".

Joseph Maclise pinups on page 3.

Unfortunately the exhibition does not come with a literal 'catalogue of irrelevant penises'.

The measure of how tall 5 yr old is getting is not pencilled lines on the wall, it's how high up the Christmas tree the spaceman, Frida Kahlo, bauble of bees, and her special rose are hanging. These were so much lower last year.

Currently writing a "Do not touch" sign for a Victorian mortuary table. Could always take inspiration from this.

Really enjoyed Wake Up Dead Man. One of the underappreciated strengths of the Benoit Blanc movies is - sort of spoilers - how it's always who you most suspect. Genuinely love them for this.

We have lent a piece of fossilised medieval poo to the Thackray Medical Museum!👇 🔗Find out more research.yorkarchaeology.co.uk/poo/ #Archaeology #History #York

Always nice to receive feedback! 💩🤮👎

Had a good time sharing the story of blood in Otley last week. Looks like the rest of the lineup was fun too

Heard of the Evelyn Tables? Displays of real human nerves & blood vessels in their positions in the body. Love that @realgdt.bsky.social included these 17th century science artifacts in #Frankenstein. Love this article by @emmalgometz.bsky.social, too! www.sciencefriday.com/articles/fra...

We're happy to share: Amazing Blood Ties! written by Jieun Kim (PI of Hematopolitics) and illustrated by Leigh Bowser. This children’s book introduces kids aged 5–8 to the stories behind blood donation and how we’re all connected. Freely available at: hematopolitics.org/amazing-bloo...

Have seen various hot takes on how faithful or otherwise del Toro has been with this. But to be honest, of the two Netflix properties we've seen on the big screen this week, it's been the other - Gabby's Dollhouse: The Movie - that seems less related to its source material.

Saw Guillermo del Toro's beautiful Frankenstein for Halloween. I love this poster's reference to the 1700s 'Flayed Angel'. Fitting for a movie that is fascinated by traditional anatomical illustration and the language it shares with Catholic art, depictions of martyred saints and memento mori.

Here we go! Just a few days now to the kick off the 2025 Otley Science Festival. Here's a picture of the week. All the details on the website otleysciencefestival.co.uk/festival-2025/ #otleyscience #otleysciencefestival #otley #otleycourthouse

Visiting the newly revamped Station Hall at National Railway Museum. A blast from the past back to when TG Jones went by a different name. (And you could buy a cheap giallo George Eliot novel on the platform).

All this talk of snakes, health and words prompts my wife to ask: "why isn't a herpetologist an expert on herpes?" Turns out they do share an etymology: 'ἕρπης' ('herpēs'), meaning 'to creep' in ancient Greek. (Herpetologist studies creeping creatures, herpes sores creep across the body).

Why did it have to be snakes? The greatest fear of antiquity-hunting adventurers is the focus of this temporary display case for Halloween half term's "Fears and Phobias" theme. (Which means spending my last afternoon before the school holidays putting a bunch of cheap plastic snakes on display).

An Autumn Lane, 1886, painting by Leeds-born John Atkinson Grimshaw (private collection). #NorthernArt

By inviting kids to keep asking questions in our latest exhibition, I have condemned myself to a job of constantly responding to weird fecal enquiries. Fortunately, having a 5 year old has been the perfect training for this.

Enjoyed visiting the Gladiators: Heroes of the Colosseum exhibition at the Armouries. Especially learning that they existed on an almost entirely bean-based diet. Which means that Russell Crowe in the training barracks should have been letting rip like that scene in Blazing Saddles.

Come and have free food and a chat about gardening at Thackray Museum this Wednesday. thackraymuseum.co.uk/event/commun...