Few can argue that British boxing history sprung from within earshot of the Bow Bells as records show that East London has produced more champions across all weights whether professional or amateur than any other place in the country. This history runs deep, as it was Bethnal Green’s bare knuckle world champion boxer Daniel Mendoza […]
Strangely enough, many people still believe Captain Bligh and Fletcher Christian to be fictional characters because of the romantic and swashbuckling nature of their exploits on the High Seas and the escape to the idyllic islands of Tahiti. It’s a tale amazing enough to grace any worthy book of literature and, indeed, movie of which […]
He’s the novelist who created the most widely known literary horror character outside of Frankenstein. Blood-sucking Count Dracula was responsible for many-a-troubled sleep with 1000 Dracula-themed books and 200 movies now available at the last count. Bram Stoker died in London on this date April 20th in 1912 aged 64 and was cremated in Golders […]
A few days back on April 15th, the birthdate of one of the Renaissance masters, Leonardo Da Vinci, was celebrated both in his home town of Florence and in some corners of London. More caught up in attracting custom than commemorations, an Italian pavement artist who goes by the street name Freddie works on a […]
On this day in 1824, the House of Commons voted to purchase banker John Julius Angerstein’s painting collection for the sum of £57,000. Parliament acted to secure these 38 paintings as a national archive and with no national gallery available they were displayed at a makeshift space at Angerstein House, 100 Pall Mall. This was […]
Confused by all the art movements which emerged from every significant aesthetic development since classicism? Does the ‘neo’ and ‘faux’ labels prefixing every new offshoot leave you flummoxed? Here’s an A-guide to the most commonly used terms and a list of the London galleries where you can see displayed examples. Abstract: This refers to art […]
Highgate Cemetery has been a century-long tourist attraction not for those with a taste for the macabre but admirers of a certain political philosopher whose Das Kapital and Communist Manifesto arguably had a greater influence on 20th and 21st-century nations and the beliefs of mankind than some major religions. Marx didn’t have too high an […]
Our Artists in London series looks at how Piet Mondrian, one of the founder members of the Association Abstraction-Creation, drew inspiration from his visits to the capital. The movement was formed in Paris in 1931 but the Dutch artist’s creative journey would have an international flavour forced by the onset of the Second World War, […]
The recent launch of the National Theatre’s Bright Young Tings photography exhibition of black theatre in London 1979-1982 will, no doubt, encourage discussion about the roots of black theatre and the ground-breaking actors that emerged. Today, What’s Hot London? looks back on the emergence of African and Caribbean theatre in the capital from as early […]
Despite his undoubted standing during the English Restoration, Samuel Pepys’ place in history would have been unremarkable were it not for his private London diaries completed from 1660-1669 and which eventually became public property. Born in Salisbury Court, Fleet Street in 1633 into a family of MPs and Lord Justices, the privileges of social class […]
Hillary Clinton Graffiti/Painting Shoreditch By Street Artist Pegasus
