Working across University of Bristol and Bristol Museums & Art Gallery collection, this project explores how material collections can act as sites for revisiting, unearthing, and reclaiming. The research fosters more equitable futures in how natural history is practised, both within and beyond the collections.
The British Empire and Commonwealth Collection (BECC) at Bristol Archives has an impressive holding of over 500,000 photographs and 2000 films dating from the late 19th to the mid-20th century from different parts of the world that formed the British empire. This project explored how the empire’s extravagant and performative culture of hunting for sport was a source of recreation and a marker of status, alongside the knowledge of a sympathetic understanding of nature and the need to preserve it.
In May 2025 Brigstow Institute launched a funding cycle around the theme of “Postcolonial natural history collections and museum and archive practices”. The theme looks to bring together individuals form diverse disciplines and practices who are interested in exploring the research value of natural history collections and archives, and postcolonial methods of museum and archive practices.
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