IWM Blog

  • View over moorland
    © Mhairi Sutherland
    Blog: Art

    The Tower, the Light and the Line

    Visual Artist Mhairi Sutherland shares details of her artwork BASE, part of 'Mapping Monuments' project. The project and Mhairi's artist residency is an exploration of the origins of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland (1824), continuing her ongoing artistic research of the militarised landscapes of the north coast of Ireland.
  • Bedroom with damaged wall and an iron frame bed
    Photograph by Turner and Drinkwater. Courtesy of Maritime Museum: Hull Museums and Gallery
    Blog: First World War

    Where Were You?

    Dr Lee Karen Stow presents the second photo essay in Visual Traces, a visual narrative exploring the wartime experiences of civilian, working-class women in her family and birthplace of Hull through the traces they left behind.
  • Green V2 rocket bomb on display in the atrium of IWM London
    IWM
    Blog: Objects

    80 years on: the V weapon attacks on Britain

    The Collections Access and Research Team will be participating in tenth annual History Day held at Senate House, London on Tuesday 5th November 2024. History Day is a day for researchers, students, and enthusiasts to explore the collections of libraries, museums and archives from all over UK. The theme for this year’s event is anniversaries and this blog will look at how V1 and V2 rockets were used against British soil eighty years ago and their impact on local communities and ordinary people’s lives.
  • Several men wading through the water with other men behind preparing to disembark landing craft
    IWM (BU 1184)
    Blog: Objects

    Commemorating D-Day: The Library Collections at IWM

    On Tuesday 5th November the Collections Access and Research team will be participating in the 10th Annual History Day, held at Senate House. History Day is a day for researchers, students, and enthusiasts to explore the collections of libraries, museums and archives from all over UK. The theme for this year’s event is anniversaries and in honour of this theme, this blog will look at the commemoration of D-Day through materials held in the Imperial War Museums’ Library collection. 
  • The We Can Do Better installation on Downhill House
    Blog: Arts and Culture

    We Can Do Better

    We Can Do Better was a takeover of Downhill House by the artist Joe Caslin in collaboration with a group of young women born after the Good Friday Agreement. Produced in Northern Ireland by the Nerve Centre, Caslin co-created the work with a group known as ‘The Kindred Collective’. The temporary, paper-based artwork stretched across the front of Downhill House and was designed in response to some of the issues affecting young people in Northern Ireland today. In this blog post, the collective explains how a nine-month process of engagement and co-creation led to a piece of work that reflected societal conflict, empowerment and change.
  • Black and white image of trees at night
    © Grzegorz Stefanski
    Blog: Arts and Culture

    locusts: a new IWM 14-18 NOW Legacy Fund art commission

    Commissioned by the IWM 14-18 NOW Legacy Fund in partnership with The Brickworks Museum, located in the village of Swanwick, Southampton, locusts brings together real-life testimonies from the local community about the Second World War and its aftermath within this part of England, whilst exploring the potential for individual and collective healing through processes of recollection and re-enactment. Joseph Constable shares his reflections on this powerful new film.
  • Nurse Elsie Sandy picking cosmos flowers outside the nurses' hostel in the grounds of the Colonial Hospital on St Vincent in March 1955.
    IWM (TR 7109)
    Blog: Objects

    Reading the West Indies: A Guide to finding Caribbean stories in our Library Collection

    A guide to locating Caribbean library resources in IWM London's Research Room, including how to search collections, book a Research Room appointment and a reading list.
  • British Royal Navy Sea King helicopter hovers above Rockall, as Navy and civilian team fight a gale to install navigation beacon.
    Image: IWM (A 35396)
    Blog: Technology and innovation

    Flight safety and you: Royal Navy Instructional films on flight safety

    Robert Rumble is the Project Curator for Lifesavers, a five-year project to explore how conflict has driven innovation in science and technology. Lifesavers is a collaboration between Imperial War Museums and Lloyd’s Register Foundation. Lifesavers is a project at Imperial War Museums, to discover the fascinating objects and stories relating to science and technology held in the museums’ collections. The project serves to improve global safety by learning from the past.
  • Landing Craft Tank (LCT) unloading a "Liberty" ship in Tripoli, Libya, February 1943.
    Image: IWM (A 16179)
    Blog: D-Day

    From Yards to Hards: Preparing Allied naval forces for the 1944 Normandy Landings

    Robert Rumble is the Project Curator for Lifesavers, a five-year project to explore how conflict has driven innovation in science and technology. Lifesavers is a collaboration between Imperial War Museums and Lloyd’s Register Foundation. Lifesavers is a project at Imperial War Museums, to discover the fascinating objects and stories relating to science and technology held in the museums’ collections. The project serves to improve global safety by learning from the past.
  • Acrobats in black outfits build a human pyramid, standing on each other's shoulders
    After the Rain, Compagnie XY. Photo © Joseph Gerard Photography.
    Blog: Arts and Culture

    After the Rain

    Part of the IWM 14-18 NOW Legacy Fund in partnership with Ulster University, 'After the Rain' was the culmination of over a years long engagement in Derry-Londonderry by the world renowned contemporary French circus troupe Compagnie XY. Rachel Melaugh, Creative Director of In Your Space Circus and producer for this project shares her reflections.
  • Old box containing many embroidered handkerchiefs
    © Lee Karen Stow
    Blog: First World War

    Unfolding Hankies

    In this guest blog post, Dr Lee Karen Stow shares insights into her new project. Unfolding her maternal grandmother Olive May Bertholini’s hankies, she also unfolds her story of war and, perhaps, of love. Hidden within these squares of delicate cotton and silk, and striped gents hankies, are memories and clues to what she and others went through during the two world wars.
  • HMS Belfast leaving Scapa Flow for the Normandy beaches in June 1944. The cruiser is reported to have fired some of the first shots on D-Day.
    © IWM (A 25665)
    Blog: D-Day

    From Yards to Hards: Preparing Allied naval forces for the 1944 Normandy Landings

    Exploring the Second World War innovations that made D-Day possible.