Briony Neilson

Photograph of a painting depicting a ploughed field in the foreground, a strip of green grass with a small human figure holding a staff, trees in the foreground, and a rising or setting sun in the middle distance behind a sky of clouds

'Ploughed field' by Caspar David Friedrich, c.1830 (oil on canvas, Hamburger Kunsthalle)

When you look at this closely, the spidery cracks in the paint only seem to intensify the beauty.

a depiction of a thistle with spiky green stalk and leaves made from cut out painted paper and topped with pink flowers

The most beautiful thing you'll see all day: a depiction of a common thistle in watercolour, gouache and cut-out green paper pasted onto paper – the extraordinary work of multi-talented George Sand from 1848 (The Met)

An old photo of a street scene with street sweepers, pedestrians and horse-drawn carriage, sandstone buildings in the background

A street sweeper and a pedestrian chat on a Sydney street, c. 1885 – an everyday scene surreptitiously captured with a hidden camera by Arthur Syer (State Library of NSW) 🗃

a depiction of a thistle with spiky green stalk and leaves made from cut out painted paper and topped with pink flowers

The most beautiful thing you'll see all day: a depiction of a common thistle in watercolour, gouache and cut-out green paper pasted onto paper – the extraordinary work of multi-talented George Sand from 1848 (The Met)

An old photo of a street scene with street sweepers, pedestrians and horse-drawn carriage, sandstone buildings in the background

A street sweeper and a pedestrian chat on a Sydney street, c. 1885 – an everyday scene surreptitiously captured with a hidden camera by Arthur Syer (State Library of NSW) 🗃

All the obvious ones in the 5th (Gibert, Compagnie, Vrin etc). Also the bookshop inside the BnF, La brèche in the 12th and A La marge in Montreuil. (Sad about the good ones that are no more - biggest loss is Le point du jour).

b&w photo of a staircase landing with a woman in dark dress looking directly at the camera and carrying a large sack on her shoulder

close-up of the same photo of the woman hauling the large sack

Ambiguous facial expression and direct gaze of this woman hauling a large sack of coal up to the 5th floor of a Parisian apartment building in 1917 (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️

b&w photo of a staircase landing with a woman in dark dress looking directly at the camera and carrying a large sack on her shoulder

close-up of the same photo of the woman hauling the large sack

Ambiguous facial expression and direct gaze of this woman hauling a large sack of coal up to the 5th floor of a Parisian apartment building in 1917 (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️

Yes, agreed. Another that comes to mind is Love is the Devil (about Francis Bacon – modern artist not philosopher – though I saw it a million years ago and maybe I wouldn't think so now). Much more recently the recent biopic about Franz Fanon (boldly titled 'Fanon') was interesting.

Do literary biopics ever really hit the mark though? Maybe I'm overlooking one/some...?

(Franck Dubosc would sort of be ideal)

Let the antiquarians have their fun

Adelaide University would cancel the UN if they could

Grim indeed. (More commonly hair/blood from animals, I’m assuming?)

Roughly around what time were they there, do you remember?

^attempted murder

On the same poignant theme, this snippet from a Sydney newspaper in 1832 reports a prisoner on Norfolk Island facing execution for murder was claiming that the governor once ordered the heads of 400 prisoners be shaved so as to use the hair to bind the lime mortar in buildings in the penal colony 🗃️

colour photograph of a sandstone building with lawns in front and a low sign reading 'Parramatta Female Factory' in the foreground

TIL that hair shaved from the heads of convict women incarcerated at the Parramatta Female Factory in the 19th century was used as a binding agent in the mortar in the building's stonework. Convicts often had to build their own prisons, but the corporeal aspect of this is particularly poignant.

A woman tends the chickens in a coop at the same Paris address (the headquarters of the Rol photojournalism agency) in 1920 (Gallica, BnF) 🗃️

b&w photo of a chicken coop on a balcony with a woman bending into the coop and a small dog leaping up to it

Tending a chicken coop on a balcony high up on a Parisian building in the 9th arrondissement in 1917 (@gallicabnf.bsky.social, @labnf.bsky.social) 🗃️

Callan Park for our Community Sign our petition: Protect Callan Park from privatisation and secure its future for community use

The historic and green space of Sydney's Callan Park is (yet again) under threat. The NSW Labor Government is seeking to privatise this jewel of public land. Sign the petition to oppose the proposal here: www.kobishetty.org.au/callan-park-...

A drawing in pen and black ink, gray wash, gouache, and watercolour of a fulgoroid (top) and a bumble bee (bottom)

This drawing on a small piece of paper of a bumble bee and a planthopper – the work of an unknown Netherlandish artist, probably from the 17th century (The Met)

b&w photo shows a man in a light-coloured shirt and trousers and hat standing next to a wooden cart on a street. A couple of pedestrians are behind him walking away from the camera.

A man sells ice-cream from a wooden cart on the streets of Havana, Cuba, c.1900 (Detroit Publishing Company photograph collection, US Library of Congress)

Note the ice-cream glasses hanging from the cart – fancy!

Fixed-term (employment through to end of 2030), full-time, teaching-focused position as Lecturer in French available at the University of Queensland. Applications close 15 March 2026.

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The Conversation is hiring two cadet journalists, send this on to all the young journos and new grads jobs.theconversation.com/jobs/5026001...

Photo of a sculpture made out of wire twisted into the shape of a fish

'Fish' wire sculpture by Alexander Calder, 1929 (brass wire, Calder Foundation)

An ID card for René Faralicq, commissaire de police with his photo on the right hand side.

book cover for a collection of poems 'L’Offrande à Béatrice' by René Faralicq

"P" is for "poet" and/or "police".
Meet René Faralicq, French police commissioner who not only presided over the Special Brigade in the interwar years and published several crime-related books, but was also a celebrated poet and a big fan of Dante 🕵️✍️🗃️

Very unexpected and welcome news!

QUT will become the new custodian of Meanjin, Australia's most eminent literary journal, bringing the publication back to Brisbane.

www.qut.edu.au/about/meanjin

Shame

Grokipedia vo.2 Family Origins and Childhood Julia Carrie Wong was born to a Chinese immigrant father and a white Jewish mother, resulting in her biracial Chinese-Jewish heritage and brown skin tone. 181

is it normal for encyclopedias to include “skin tone” or just when they’re generated by a white nationalist’s ai?