This remarkable colour photograph of hot air balloons at the inaugural Paris Air Show was taken in 1909 by Léon Gimpel, using the Autochrome Lumière process, the first commercial process for colour photography

Hello Monday. British Library, Harley MS 3244, folio 59r.

Le Poulpe Colossal ~ Pierre Dénys de Montfort (1801)

Hello Monday. ‘Jane Small’, Hans Holbein.

Saturday plans: Sleeping grey cat and a rat, Adolf von Becker, 1864. #Caturday

Today’s (very nautical) finds in the secondhand bookshop at @nationaltrust.org.uk Dyffryn Gardens ⚓️ Having just started researching the Royal Navy in the 18th & 19th century I couldn’t believe my luck! Not to mention Frenchman’s Creek has been on my tbr for ages too!! :)

keeping an eye out for Spring…

Today’s charity shop find: an Old Curiosity Shop hardback with original illustrations :-)

three hares (holy trinity) germany, 16th century

The lace maker, 1662. Seems so quiet, but you know her bobbins are clicking away. By Caspar Netscher, whose day is today.

Day twenty four of our #ArtistAdventCalendar, and to celebrate all the hard work he will be doing later today,‘Old Father Christmas’, by Scottish artist, William Ewart Lockhart (1846–1900), in the collection of The Hunterian, University of Glasgow @hunterianmuseum.bsky.social

Vilhelm Hammershøi (Danish, 1864–1916). Interior, Sunlight on the Floor (oil on canvas).

Born OTD in 1654, in Antwerp, Jan van Kessel the Younger. Like his father, a painter of bugs, beasts, & other naturalia. Occasionally humans too. Here, butterflies, shells, etc in 1680.

Festive witches' sabbath as imagined by a follower of Jan Mandijn. Because who could resist those dancing cats?

Anyone shocked that Reform plan to deport immigrants with Indefinite Leave to Remain hasn’t been paying attention. Next it will be stripping citizenship from dual citizens, then deporting them. Who do you think Reform are? This. This is who they are.

There’s a tradition in some European countries called “telling the bees,” in which bees are informed of notable events in the human world. In Oxford, when a hive’s owner dies, a member of the family will tap on the hive with a housekey and say, “Bees, bees, your master is dead.”

Kier Starmer's statement that includes the words "We must all be free to debate openly and freely without fear - there can be no justification for political violence" feels *slightly* hypocritical when he criminalises peaceful protest, endorses transphobia, and fully backs UK arms sales to Israel.

'The Backs of Houses, Harley Street, London' (1925) by Algernon Cecil Newton (London Museum)

Fucking hell. I just posted today about how higher ed always devalues the humanities & how it's linked to legacy media laying off seasoned cultural critics. It's all connected: defunding the humanities & public media, pushing AI on us - it's about destroying critical thinking.

DRACULA x THE SECRET HISTORY 1895. A young man falls headlong into the Greco-Roman drinking society of an infamous author, but when he witnesses the sacrificial killing of a boy, he must choose between morality and immortality - before his own blood is spilt. #QueerPit #HF #H

Sky, Sapphire, Cerulean, Cyan, Cobalt, Azure, Navy and Ultramarine - a bonanza of blues for today’s #ShadesofSaturday. …

Good morning rebels...

Ladybird endpapers ‘Hedgerow’ (1979) Artist: John Leigh-Pemberton

Goodnight. 🖼️ Yuri Vasnetsov

Daughters of the Mist, 1900-1919, by #EvelynDeMorgan (British, 1855-1919), who died #otd, May 2. Held by the @demorganfoundation.bsky.social, www.demorgan.org.uk/collection/d... #womenartists #artherstory

The Tea, about 1880, by #MaryCassatt (American, 1844-1926). On view at @mfaboston.bsky.social in Gallery 226, collections.mfa.org/objects/32829 #NationalTeaDay #womenartists #artherstory

Art.

#TheVictorianBookoftheDead Beautiful ambrotype of a young woman in mourning, 1860s. eBay listing

Female and non-binary writers are driving a vibrant new sub-genre featuring strange, unhinged underdogs, says Chloe Johnson 👇 #BookSky

Just found out my poetry has been stolen by Meta to train its AI. I’m a nobody in the writing world, my career as a poet & author is only just beginning & already my work has fallen victim to Meta (like so many others!) I’d love to know what @ukparliament.parliament.uk is planning to do about this

Happy (Spring) Equinox! 💚🌱💮🐰🥚

Morning music https://www.wikiart.org/en/dante-gabriel-rossetti/morning-music-1864

Illustrated manuscript (the first ‘little book’) by Charlotte Brontë, c.1828 (when she was aged 11-12), the author who later went on to write 'Jayne Eyre' #womensart

It's #PancakeDay! 🥞 In some parts of Wales, it was believed that if pancakes were not made and tossed on this day, there would be little prosperity during the ensuing year. #ShroveTuesday #Wales #History

The Moon's My Constant Mistress⁣ — Norman Lindsay, 1918

Adam Ant, during the filming of the Stand & Deliver video, Hatfield House, Hertfordshire, Spring 1981, by Allan Ballard.

I think I’m obsessed with this actually????

NORTHANGER ABBEY X CRUEL INTENTIONS When a writer chances upon a charismatic man that resembles the hero of her Gothic novel, the two court scandal by seducing young women into buying her book – with fatal results. THE DARK ART will appeal to fans of Kat Dunn’s HUNGERSTONE #questpit #Q #HF #A #DF

Today, the UK government announced a proposal to change copyright law - for the benefit of AI companies - that would cause huge, irreversible harm to creators. More info below, but most importantly here's what you can do (wherever you live): 1. Email your MP. Template letter in 🧵 👇 1/10

Dantes and Devotions, Beatrice and Dante, Siddal and Rossetti, for this #FeelingsFriday. Rossetti modeled Beatrice after his wife, fellow artist and poet, collaborator and frequent model, Elizabeth Siddal. Comparing his devotion to that of his namesake, the poet, Dante Alighieri.

based on the law where i live, i can be arrested for doing a poetry reading anywhere that isn’t exclusively 18+. i had to quit my job leading a local book club at a bookstore. i don’t think people realize how surreal things are becoming for trans people on the level of day-to-day life. crazy shit.

I love this sketch by Steinlen. It feels like they are relaxed and triumphant, surveying their work after knocking everything off that dresser. fineartamerica.com/featured/two...

The biggest enabler for creativity is stability. I wish that was made more central to the creative narrative. Figure out what your specific needs are to limit stressors and enable "boring" time and work to achieve that as hard as you're practicing your art.

Spent my Saturday being amazed at how insane, fast-paced and convoluted Arthurian myth can be

I don't know how to explain this but I think my life would be better if I was a tiny frog sitting under a tiny mushroom peacefully listening to the rain.

How I'm trying to be