Blogs

Join the London Archives for an evening of specially devised entertainment by the renowned magic lantern performers Jeremy and Carolyn Brooker from the Magic Lantern Society. This is in conjunction with our 'Lost Victorian City' exhibition. The show will feature an authentic triunial (or Triple) magic lantern combining three projectors in a single device. This is the most complex and rarest form of magic lantern entertainment creating fast-moving shows featuring the most spectacular effects the lantern can produce. Carolyn and Jeremy Brooker have been performing together for over 20 years to perfect this demanding art (www.jeremybrooker.com).

With live musical accompaniment provided by acclaimed silent film pianist Costas Fotopoulos (http://www.costasfotopoulos.com/). Costas is based in London and works internationally as a composer and arranger for film, the stage and the concert hall, and performs as a concert, silent film and jazz pianist.

EXHIBITION: Visit the 'Lost Victorian City' exhibition, which will be available to view before the main event, and view an additional display of documents around the theme of gothic London specially curated for the evening.

Magic Lantern Show
24 october 2024 at 1830-2100 (BST)
The London Archives, 40 Northampton Road London EC1R 0HB

See: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/magic-lantern-show-tickets-978275376987

On 15 July 2024, Sky released the official trailer for upcoming Sky Original film Lee. The powerful trailer sees Kate Winslet in her role playing Lee Miller, one of the most important photographers of her time, as she embarks onto the front line of WWII to capture some of the most significant wartime images for British Vogue. The trailer also gives audiences a glimpse at Andy Samberg, Alexander Skarsgård, Marion Cotillard and Andrea Riseborough in their respective roles.

Lee tells the story of Lee Miller (Winslet), American photographer. Determined to document the truth of the Nazi regime, and in spite of the odds stacked against female correspondents, Lee captured some of the most important images of World War II, but they came at an enormous personal price.

Joining Winslet is Andy Samberg playing Life Magazine photographer David E. Scherman; Alexander Skarsgård playing English Surrealist painter, photographer, poet and biographer Roland Penrose; Marion Cotillard playing Solange D’Ayen, the fashion director of French Vogue and close friend of Miller’s: Josh O’Connor playing Tony, a young journalist and Andrea Riseborough playing British Vogue Editor Audrey Withers.

Directed by Ellen Kuras. Produced by Kate Solomon and Kate Winslet, with Troy Lum, Andrew Mason, Marie Savare and Lauren Hantz. Executive Producers are Julia Stuart and Laura Grange, Finola Dwyer, Thorsten Schumacher, Billy Mulligan, John Hantz, Jason Duan, Crystine Zhang, Lem Dobbs, Liz Hannah, John Collee and Clare Hardwick.

The film premiered in London recently and will be in cinemas from 13 September for a limited period before coming to Sky Cinema later in 2024. It stars Kate Winslet and is directed by Ellen Kuras. 

See more: https://www.sky.com/watch/lee#learn-more

The John Rylands Research Institute and Library has excellent holdings of early photographic albums and photographically illustrated books, including work by eminent and pioneering photographers such as William Henry Fox Talbot, Roger Fenton, Francis Frith and James Mudd, as well as a number of albums by unknown or anonymous individuals.

This collection contains seven important early photographic albums and will be added to as part of the Library’s ongoing digitisation programme. Highlights of this collection include the albums The Pencil of Nature (1844) by William Henry Fox Talbot, English architecture and landscapes (c1860) by Roger Fenton, Intérieurs Anglais (1880’s – 1890’s) by Henry Bedford Lemere and West Riding Asylum, Menston, Yorkshire (1901) by Dr Thomas O'Conor Donelan. They also demonstrate multiple analogue photographic processes such as albumen, salt, cyanotype and silver gelatine prints.

Read more and explore the albums here: https://www.digitalcollections.manchester.ac.uk/collections/earlyphotography/1

Image: from Recollections of Dunham. An album of photographs of Dunham Massey, Trafford, by James Mudd one of Manchester’s most important Victorian photographers. See: https://www.digitalcollections.manchester.ac.uk/view/VS-VPH-00010/15

Shining Lights is the first critical anthology to bring together the groundbreaking work of Black women photographers active in the UK during the 1980s and 1990s, providing a richly illustrated overview of a significant and overlooked chapter of photographic history. Seen through the lens of Britain’s sociopolitical and cultural contexts, the publication draws on both lived experience and historical investigation to explore the communities, experiments, collaborations and complexities that defined the decades.

This symposium, hosted by Shining Lights’ editor and artist Joy Gregory, provides an opportunity to further examine and debate the issues raised in the book, through the voices of the publication’s contributors and leading intergenerational thinkers.

Join us to celebrate this timely and important publication and foreground the contribution of Black women photographers to the history of the artistic medium.

Confirmed participants: Christine Checinska, Poulomi Desai, Bernardine Evaristo, Lola Flash, Mumtaz Karimjee (virtually), Roshi Naidoo, Symrath Patti, Eileen Perrier, Lola Olufemi.

Full programme to be announced soon.

Produced in partnership with the V&A Parasol Foundation Women in Photography Project, Fast Forward: Women in Photography at University for the Creative Arts and the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art.

The publication is co-published by MACK & Autograph ABP. With thanks to Joy Gregory Studio.

Details: https://www.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk/whats-on/forthcoming/shining-lights-photography-conference

Is anyone able to help me identify the place these photographs were taken? I am looking for certain photographs taken around Lake Chad in the 1850s, but I don't know what that area would have looked like then. If anyone can point me in the right direction I would be grateful! Ella