Tag Archives: bust

Sep 25 2026
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Daily Post, Interior

Pankhurst in the Arndale

Thursday 24th September 2026, 11.05am (day 5,509)

Pankhurst bust, 24/9/26

One of the main halls of Manchester’s Arndale Centre has recently been filled with these large, soft, Cluedo-style busts of famous Mancunians, and Emmeline Pankhurst definitely counts as one of those. People say that nowadays we’d have called the suffragettes ‘terrorists’ but that was also true at the time. They got what was right, though. In case this all seems too radical for a shopping centre, rest assured that to my right at this point are similar busts of, amongst others, Noel Gallagher, Marcus Rashford and Caroline Aherne.

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Sep 15 2026
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Art and architecture, Daily Post

The Back to Work feeling

Tuesday 15th September 2026, 8.55am (day 5,500)

Facepalm statuette, 15/9/26

Well, that’s the end of my trilogy of summer holidays (Tromsø, Bristol, Luxembourg): nicely indulgent but it’s back to work tomorrow. These little statuettes were a feature of our apartment and seem to sum up the feelings, though I accept that it is unreasonable to complain, as such.

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Apr 28 2026
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Daily Post, Portrait

Rutherford

Monday 27th April 2026, 12.55pm (day 5,359)

Rutherford Theatre, 27/4/26

Professor Ernest Rutherford, originally from New Zealand, was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1908 even before he conducted, with Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden, the famous experiment where a bunch of alpha particles were fired at a sheet of gold and some of them bounced back, which Rutherford allegedly said was like firing a missile at a sheet of tissue paper and having it come back and hit you. From this was established the existence of the atomic nucleus, not to mention the original Geiger counter. For this reason Prof Rutherford is one of those former ‘Employees of the Month’ that the University of Manchester likes to big up. But in this case, why not? (Incidentally the room in which this experiment took place is still there, although no longer a laboratory — last time I looked it could be booked as a meeting room.)

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Jan 31 2024
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Daily Post, Interior

In Café la Gaffe

Tuesday 30th January 2024, 9.50pm (day 4,541)

In Café la Gaffe, 30/1/24

This is not particularly Toronto-specific. There are at least three, and probably more, blatant electrical wires running across the shot in various directions. There are all sorts of reflections intruding and the head resides above what appears to be a fusebox. Nevertheless this is certainly my most interesting shot of the day, it feels to me like a collage. (The food in this place had similar characteristics — that is, random and possibly incompatible things nevertheless pushed together into the same space — but that’s another story.)

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Dec 13 2023
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Daily Post, Interior

Samuel Alexander, Professor of Philosophy

Tuesday 12th December 2023, 9.20am (day 4,492)

Samuel Alexander Xmas decorations, 12/12/23

Prof. Alexander’s bust has long graced the entrance hall of the building on Manchester’s campus that bears his name. This kind of thing happens most years, to be honest. He seems to bear it with stoic dignity. I don’t think he looks all that unhappy — a bit resigned, maybe.

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Apr 05 2017
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Daily Post, Interior

Professor Schuster

Tuesday 4th April 2017, 10.45am (day 2,049)

Schuster bust, 4/4/17

Found myself in the Physics and Astronomy building on Manchester today, named for Arthur Schuster, physicist and coiner of the term ‘antimatter’ whose bust in the foyer currently sports a rather fetching pink bow tie and fluffy rabbit ears. And why not.

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