Welcome to the age of consumerism! The 18th century has arrived, bringing the birth of the industrial revolution, the spread of global trade and capitalism, empire, and the abhorrent transatlantic...
This week on BBC Four Andrew Graham Dixon presents the first of a new series ‘Art, Passion and Power: the Story of the Royal Collection’, featuring the portrait drawings and...
Among the treasures of the Heywood archive is a single-sheet broadside that would be easy to overlook. Yet the item, entitled The Provisional Government to the People of Ireland, is...
The current season of Christmas songs and carols carries on a centuries old tradition. The first Christmas celebrations may have drawn upon pagan customs, but our earliest reference to Christmas...
During their residency of exploration and study, Brass Art spent time looking at the Library’s collection of works on human anatomy, chiefly William Cowper’s The anatomy of humane bodies (Oxford: 1698)....
As we reach the end of Brass Art’s magical installation ‘Gestured’, we’re delighted to share this insightful and thought-provoking essay by Dr Rowan Bailey of the Sculptural Research Group based...
For the past few years, digitisation has become a “hot” word in the development plans of museums, libraries and archives. The process entails the creation of high-resolution digital surrogates of...
Among the works in the collection that inspired and influenced Brass Art’s commission ‘Gestured’ were some of the engravings and etchings of William Hogarth (1697-1764). The Library’s Hogarth collection consists...
Announcing a new residency in partnership with Book Works For this open call we are inviting artists to propose a project that engages creatively and critically with Chetham’s Library, and...
Almost 200 years after the Peterloo Massacre, we can read contemporary press reports of this horrific event in Chetham’s Library’s Hay scrapbooks, which have just returned from a much needed...
