There were many beautiful moments in 2025, but this was the the most moving: 27 July in Shropshire. I found the grave of pioneering colour writer Mary Gartside, and her real name: Martha Gartside. With thanks to @sussex.ac.uk , @clhlwr.bsky.social, and many others. www.sussex.ac.uk/research/cen...

The opposite of writer's block: The Royal Pavilion: A Regency Palace of Colour and Sensation, published this year by @yalebooks.bsky.social . A few signed copies available in the Royal Pavilion shop. Pics taken today by Adrienn Deutsch.

ICMY, the full 2025 Seamus Heaney Lecture, given by Sir Simon Schama on the topic of ‘Politics and the Poet’ and featuring poetry readings by Leanne Best, is now up at youtu.be/KtQVa_H0hEA. Read more about the lecture @livuninews.bsky.social: news.liverpool.ac.uk/2025/11/25/i...

Portrait (2025) with Martha (Mary) Gartside's colour blots from 1805. By Jane Palmer.

Well, this was a bit of a surprise: Helena Bonham Carter with my TASCHEN Book of Colour Concepts in a photoshoot for jewellery designer Larkspur & Hawk. I am thrilled. larkspurandhawk.com/pages/once-u...

When you get a free meal in a very nice museum restaurant because they have a dish on the menu that could have been named after your book. Thank you, Verde Miami at Perez Art Museum for The Artist's Palette 🎨! (Note the palette knife.) @princetonupress.bsky.social @thamesandhudson.bsky.social

On a sabbatical, in Florida. There is a lot of colour in Miami Beach - day and night.

The Colour exhibition at the Royal Pavilion may have finished, but there are some new and exciting colour projects coming up soon. Watch these pigments, Miss Gartside, and my green silk blouse... (Photo by Stephen Engelhardt)

Portrait of Anna Boch holding a splendid neo-Impressionist palette, by Théo van Rysselberghe (1892), and an atmpospheric work by Anna Boch herself, titled Evening (1891). At the National Gallery's exhibition Radical Harmony.

The COLOUR exhibition at the Royal Pavilion finishes soon, but I have one more #ColourConversation up my sleeve: Join me on 11 October, 11am for a talk on colour in the Royal Pavilion. There will be Prussian Blue, Chrome Yellow, Chinese Vermilion and more! brightonmuseums.org.uk/event/johndi...

Gaga ooh-la-la. Mayhem at the 02 in London tonight. #LadyGaga

Went to the @royalacademyarts.bsky.social London to sign a few books. Did not expect THIS. Signed copies of The Artist's Palette @thamesandhudson.bsky.social and both versions of The Book of Colour Concepts (TASCHEN) now available at the Academy. 🎨 🎨 🎨

Stepping in for another speaker next week at the Regency Society, to talk about Georgian colour theorist Miss Gartside (and my holiday in Shropshire):

While searching for the 1819 grave of colour theorist Mary Gartside in Shropshire, I am unwittingly channelling Kate Bush in 1978.

Watching swallows at Stokesay Castle, Shropshire.

Up close with the luminous abstract paintings of Mali Morris. At the @royalacademyarts.bsky.social Summer Exhibition 2025.

On Saturday 12 July I will be squeezing colour out of 3 artists as if they were paint tubes: Peter Messer, Jo Lamb and Julian Bell will be talking about pigments, palettes and paint in the next Colour Conversation at Brighton Museums. Dragon's Blood will fly! brightonmuseums.org.uk/event/colour...

It's been quite a week. V&A lecture, heatwave, and book launch of The Royal Pavilion (@yalebooks.bsky.social). Buried myself in this humongous bunch of flowers this weekend, feeling grateful (and exhausted). Thank you all for coming!

Just really enjoying my job, even on the hottest of days. Introduced my book on the Royal Pavilion ( @yalebooks.bsky.social ) to an audience at the V&A, London.. A beautiful occasion. Thank you all for coming. The Royal Pavilion, Brighton - Yale University Press London share.google/6q72QwVk3KLs...

This coming Tuesday, 1 July, I will be introducing the Royal Pavilion and my new book about it (with Yale University Press) at the Victoria & Albert Museum. Please join me if you can. The Royal Pavilion, Brighton - Talk at V&A South Kensington www.vam.ac.uk/event/gdpMdq...

The day before tomorrow: my new book on the Royal Pavilion has arrived in Brighton Museums' shop, and I have been signing a few copies. Publication date 24 June 2025. @yalebooks.bsky.social yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300...

Sharon Black wins 39th Frogmore Poetry Prize Glasgow-born poet Sharon Black now lives in a remote valley of the Cévennes in France. Sharon was previously awarded the Frogmore Prize in 2011 and joins a select group of poets who have won the Prize more than once www.frogmorepress.co.uk/uncategorize...

China in my hand. Hangzhou. It is very wet, but the umbrellas are pretty.

A murmuration of palettes by Cornelia Parker, at Frith Street Gallery, London. With the lovely Zeynep Sagir.

Laburnum arches in bloom, first waterlililes, newts, tadpoles, and dragonflies at Preston Manor, Brighton, this weekend.

Flattered. And delighted. And thank you so much for THE Girl, and THE Goldfinch. Next time at @mauritshuis.bsky.social

The Weekend Essay looks at Trump's war on knowledge. As the US government attacks its finest universities, Simon Schama cites the Founding Fathers’ belief that the great driver of freedom is knowledge. An essay as angry as it is erudite on.ft.com/4iAKcza

In this week's Country Life magazine: Mary Gartside, one of the stars of the Colour exhibition at the Royal Pavilion. Gartside was the first known woman who published an illustrated book on colour, in 1805.

The programme of our closing conference "Chromatic Encounters" (26-28 June, Paris) is now online! Registration is free but compulsory. More info here : chromotope.eu/chromatic-en... We look forward to seeing you in Paris.

Signed copies of The Artist's Palette 🎨 (@thamesandhudson.bsky.social) now available in the National Gallery, London. And should you want to practice, they also have real palettes.

Wonderful essay by Simon Schama on David Hockney on.ft.com/4ihV44O

Current work dress code: Blue for the Royal Pavilion, yellow for Preston Manor.

Also daughter.

Abstract mother and daughter. Museum Barberini, Potsdam.

I've been tangoed in @thetimes.com 🍊. A photograph by Andrew Hasson of the opening of the COLOUR exhibition at the Royal Pavilion, Brighton.

I've got Goethe mail. But why isn't he writing about colour? And was he left-handed or right-handed? He keeps losing his hat. Thank you, @fedecks.bsky.social . I am chuffed to little bits (look it up).

COLOUR at the Royal Pavilion is now open! Incredible teamwork. Prepare to be surprised! (Although you won't be surprised to hear that Mary Gartside is making an appearance...). Photo by Andrew Hasson, banyan made and lent by Zack Pinsent. brightonmuseums.org.uk/colour-at-th...

Colour teasers! The COLOUR exhibition at the Royal Pavilion is almost ready. It will be a feast of colour, I promise you. brightonmuseums.org.uk/colour-at-th...

Upcoming COLOUR events at the Royal Pavilion. Talks, concerts and more with great speakers and musicians, incl. Patrick Baty, Peter Messer, Neil Parkinson, Jo Lamb, @breceh.bsky.social, Jenny Bosten, Emma Bestley, Zeynep Sagir, Maggie Cole, Sebastian Comberti: brightonmuseums.org.uk/colour-at-th...

Artwork reveal for the new exhibition COLOUR at the Royal Pavilion! How much do I love this Pavilion colour wheel? Let me count the tones... More info soon. There'll be colour conversations, music, art, a feast of pigments, a chameleon trail, and much more brightonmuseums.org.uk/royal-palace...

It's #worldbookday2025, so here are the books I have published recently: The Book of Colour Concepts (TASCHEN) Mary Gartside: Abstract Visions of Colour (Thomas Heneage Art Books) The Artist's Palette (@thamesandhudson.bsky.social @princetonupress.bsky.social) Thank you, readers and publishers!

The beauty of museums and art galleries: Aristide Maillol, Robert Delaunay, David Chipperfield. Kunsthaus Zürich

I stepped into Pipilotti Rist's Pixel Forest (Pixelwald) at Kunsthaus Zürich.

We are excited to announce a new 2025 exhibition: "The botanical world of Mary Delany and Georgie Hopton – a domestic arrangement". This exhibition will launch 15 March and run until 15 June 2025. Advance tickets are available through our website: no1royalcrescent.org.uk/temporary-ex...

Weekend reading. Thinking about the next writing project. #PaulineBoty #DerekJarman #flowerpainting #MrsDelany

Pink into red: I just voted remotely in the German general election. NOT AFD. Please use your vote. Don't let it go to waste. #Bundestagswahl2025 #Briefwahl #Düsseldorf

Here is the first press coverage of the upcoming #COLOUR exhibition at the Royal Pavilion, Brighton. Opens 21 March 2025 @sussexexclusive.bsky.social @sussexuni.bsky.social

The PhD I am co-supervising at the Royal Pavilion and @sussexuni.bsky.social is bursting with colour and wildlife. This early 19th-century Chinese wallpaper looks greyish-blue now but is likely the one described as 'lilac' in the Royal Pavilion account books.

One night in Berlin. En route to the Rhineland. #Stippvisite

My excuse to wear a lot of colourful dresses and shoes this year: Press release for COLOUR exhibition at the Royal Pavilion! Launches - appropriately enough - on International Colour Day, 21 March 2025. brightonmuseums.org.uk/royal-palace...