Images, Objects, and Their Afterlives with Professor Annebella Pollen

Selvedge readers are warmly invited to an illuminating lecture by Professor Annebella Pollen, a cultural historian renowned for her expertise in design, craft, dress, and photography. This inaugural lecture, titled Images, Objects and their Afterlives, will take place at the Sallis Benney Theatre in Brighton on Wednesday, 5 March 2025, and promises a compelling exploration of visual and material culture.

Professor Pollen’s work poses thought-provoking questions: What stories can historic images and objects tell about the past? When preserved in personal collections or institutional archives, what futures are they meant to serve? And what happens when those narratives fade or are forgotten?

For over two decades, Professor Pollen has reinterpreted undervalued collections, shining a light on visual and material culture often relegated to the margins. Her research spans diverse realms, from photographs salvaged during house clearances to the visual archives of utopian movements. Through this work, she examines what societies choose to preserve, what they discard, and how these decisions reveal intersecting dynamics of value, memory, and power...

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