‘A Personal Journey of Discovery’, by Douglas Downing

Douglas Downing is a descendant of the Dalziel family. He has a passion for all things digital, including photography, film and television production.  His early experiences working for ITV Anglia and the Natural History Museum, gave him the opportunity to indulge in his fascination of researching and rediscovering forgotten stories and exploring unknown places. Here, he…

‘Magic into Print’ – some thoughts on the history of wood engraving, by Brian Maidment

Brian Maidment is Professor of the History of Print at Liverpool John Moores University. His research interests are focused on the nineteenth century, especially mass circulation, popular and illustrated literature, and he has published widely on a broad range of topics, although more recently he has concentrated his interests on Victorian periodicals and early nineteenth-century…

Knight and Beggar, by Huddie Hamper

We collaborated with UCA Rochester on a project for 16 to 18-year-old art students. Huddie Hamper created a woodcut inspired by ‘Prince Bahman and the Dervish’ in Dalziel’s Arabian Nights’ Entertainments (i.e. The Thousand and One Nights), 1865. Here, Hamper reflects on the creative process behind his woodcut ‘Knight and Beggar’: This work was heavily influenced by the…

Mollusc and Rossetti illustrations, Dalziel

Woodpeckings: Victorian prints, book illustration and word-image narratives, British Museum, 16-17 June 2017

Friday 16th – Saturday 17th June 9am-5pm Stevenson Lecture Theatre, British Museum Registration for this event is now closed.   Conference Programme  Book for conference drinks & buffet This two-day event presents new perspectives on Victorian prints, book illustration and word-image narratives, brought into dialogue with scholarly interpretations of the Dalziel Archive, a phenomenal resource for…

"Who cares for you? You're nothing but a pack of cards!", Maisy Plummer

“Who cares for you? You’re nothing but a pack of cards!” By Maisy Plummer

We collaborated with UCA Rochester to pilot a project for 16 to 18-year-old art students. Here we publish Maisy Plummer’s reimagining of the Dalziel Brothers: a coruscating satire that brings Victorian illustrations into dialogue with our contemporary moment. The illustrations Plummer used are from Carroll’s Alice books, Valentine’s Warne’s Home Annual, Rowley’s Gamosagammon, and the magazine London Society. Scroll down…

Caught in Time

We are currently planning a co-curated, touring digital exhibition on Victorian illustration and its relationship to contemporary art, including wood engraving, illustration and digital art forms. The exhibition has the working title Caught in Time and will be hosted at public libraries and university digital humanities labs nationwide, installed through multiple screens and projection. The travelling display…

Dalziel engraving (Ice Bound, by Helen Bailey)

Ice bound, by Helen Bailey

Helen Bailey’s poem ‘Ice bound’ was inspired by fragments of texts on wood engraving, natural history and Arctic exploration. It developed out of an exercise in cut-up poetry, at our creative writing workshop on seascapes and the Arctic, held in the Prints and Drawings department of the British Museum on 3rd December 2016. The texts that were used are listed below…

National Art and Design Saturday Club Masterclass

Re-imagining the Dalziels: National Art and Design Saturday Club Masterclass, University of the Creative Arts, 29 April 2017

On Saturday 29th April 2017 the Dalziel Project ran a masterclass for the National Art and Design Saturday Club at the University of the Creative Arts, Rochester. The Saturday Club is an independent charity working with 13-16 year olds and dedicated to raising attainment, broadening horizons and enhancing life skills. Hosting their sessions in museums and universities across the UK,…

Ink and Light, by Lindsay Smith

Lindsay Smith is Professor of English and co-director of the Centre for Photography and Visual Culture at the University of Sussex. She has written extensively on Victorian painting, poetry and photography, and her work continues to engage the difficult and hesitant spaces between established disciplines. Lindsay’s most recent project is on Lewis Carroll as a creator…

Narwhal wood engraving (Song for Gouging Wood and Water)

‘Song for gouging wood and water’, a collaborative sonnet

This collaborative sonnet was improvised during our creative writing workshop on seascapes and the Arctic, in the Prints and Drawings department of the British Museum on 3rd December. The sonnet responds to wood engravings by Dalziel and Nancy Campbell’s poetry collection, Disko Bay. By Sarah Alexander, Helen Bailey, Camilla Bostock, Nancy Campbell, Nancy Gaffield, Cage Williams, Katerina Klaric, Jane McCarthy…

Dalziel, Arctic Seascape

Seascapes and The Arctic ~ Creative Writing Workshop, British Museum, 3rd December 2016

  An afternoon of talks and creative writing practice around the collections of the British Museum’s department of Prints and Drawings, led by Forward Prize short-listed poet Nancy Campbell, and Bethan Stevens (University of Sussex). This session included creative writing and discussion focussed on wood engravings from the Dalziel Archive in the British Museum. During the afternoon, Nancy Campbell…

The Hatter and the King's Messenger, Dalziel after John Tenniel for Lewis Carroll's Alice

The Hatter and the King’s Messenger, by Nicholas Royle

In celebration of the publication of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland in November 1865, we have a special blog post by Nicholas Royle, Professor of English at the University of Sussex. In this piece he responds to the two images below, two different renderings of same illustration, known as ‘Living Backward’, or the ‘Hatter in Prison’. On the…