Blog / Collections

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Wonderful Whale 33: The Discovery

By Bonnie Griffin, Natural History curator You may find some of the images in this blog post upsetting. For many years the head of a huge whale has been sitting on a shelf in the biology store, with its only markings being the numerals XXXIII and a la…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

How would you like to own these pictures?

By Trevor Coombs, Documentation Assistant – Fine Art Earlier this year, Bristol Museum & Art Gallery licensed 2,300 digital images from the Fine Art collection to Bridgeman Images to sell on our behalf. We’ve had a commercial relationship with Brid…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Curators of the Caribbean

By Victoria Purewal, Senior Curator for Natural Sciences 300 year old plant collection brings Bristol Museum & Art Gallery and the Natural History Museum of Jamaica together. Back in the autumn of 2014, I was fortunate to be contracted by Bristo…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Rediscovered: The Clymene Dolphin

by Bonnie Griffin, Natural History curator and Bill Brind, volunteer Recent rummaging in the natural history stores at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery has led to the uncovering of an interesting specimen; the skull of a Clymene dolphin (Stenella …

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

A Close Shave – a spaghetti junction in the city docks

By Dave Sage, M Shed volunteer As one ambles along the dockside taking in a visit to M Shed and enjoying everything the area has to offer in terms of leisure and pleasure, it’s salutary to think that this area would look very different if planners had t…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

M Shed welcomes St Mungo’s

By Aoife Barrett, Unit 10 artist and Bristol Culture visitor assistant Back in June, as part of a new city-council artwork project called Threshold, St Mungo’s participants were treated to a behind-the-scenes tour of the wonderful treasures housed in L Sh…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

The Bristol Maker Walk – what’s it all about?

by Lee Hutchinson, Curator of Industrial and Maritime History Over recent weeks, our Industrial and Maritime History department, based at M Shed, has been taking part in the Bristol Maker Walk project. But why – and what’s it all about? Put simply, it’s a…

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

New acquisition: Portrait of Tachaco by Nocona Burgess

by Alex Rankin, Senior Visitor Assistant In January, the museum purchased a painting by Nocona Burgess, a Native American artist. Burgess, who is a member of the Comanche Nation of Native Americans, caught the attention of museum curators after a solo …

Posted on by Fay Curtis.

Conserving Bristol’s Fine Art displays

Work is well underway refurbishing the Old Masters gallery by taking down the old damask wall covering and giving it a new coat of paint, as well as repairing the ceiling and dealing with various other challenges that old buildings present.