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Group of children on a city street, one wearing a werewolf mask, others pulling scary faces and raising hands toward camera. Black and white.

Halloween in Brooklyn, photographed over 50 years

Spirits and soul — Larry Racioppo’s new book documents half a century of the October festivities in New York, while tracing the city’s ever-changing character.

  • Culture
  • Anna Stafford

The long history of slop in music

Top of the Slops — The term might be everywhere now, but the act of copying and enshittifying has been around for decades, explains Ian McQuaid.

  • Music
  • Ian McQuaid
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© Tom Hunter

New exhibition highlights British radical living over 200 years

Earthly Paradise — Taking place at the William Morris Gallery, it explores the homes and lives of artists, writers, musicians and more, as well as the conditions that allowed them to thrive.

  • Activism
  • Isaac Muk

In photos: Electric nights in ’70s Japan

Tokyo–Koza — Keizō Kitajima’s new photobook explores the explosion of party culture of Tokyo and Okinawa during an era of rapid change in the country, as well as its stranger turns.

  • Culture
  • Miss Rosen

The London sword fighters reviving medieval combat

Schola Gladitoria — Studying ancient textbooks and techniques, the historical European martial arts community duel with centuries old systems of engagement. Mads Jensen swings a blade in an Ealing church to find out more.

  • Sport
  • Mads Jensen
© Charles Williams (1908-1986)

Historic photographs from the heyday of the Black press

Black Photojournalism — A new book immortalises the work of 57 Black photographers reporting in the mid-20th century for Black newspapers and magazines. Covering the Civil Rights Movement, Jesse Jackson and more, the pictures are part history, part art.

  • Culture
  • Miss Rosen
© Jane Evelyn Atwood

Glaswegian life, captured over 80 years of redevelopment and flux

Still Glasgow — An expansive new GoMA exhibition, curated by Katie Bruce, explores culture and people in the Scottish city, from its post-war tenement communities to its busking musicians.

  • Culture
  • Zoe Whitfield
© Elaine Constantine

In photos: The colourful, foreboding techno-optimism of the ’90s

A Visual History — Henry Carroll’s new book traces the roots of unfettered, present-day neoliberalism through images from the 20th century’s final decade, raising questions about how we arrived at where we are today.

  • Culture
  • Miss Rosen
© Fern Logan

25 years ago, Reflections in Black changed photography

A History of Black Photographers — Deborah Willis’s photobook anthologised pictures made by James Van Der Zee, Anthony Barboza and other groundbreaking Black photographers from when the medium was invented. A new edition updates it with 21st century contributions.

  • Culture
  • Miss Rosen
Vintage sepia photograph showing ornate funeral parlour with open casket surrounded by numerous floral arrangements and palm fronds.
© James Van Der Zee Archive / The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Sombre, tender photos of final goodbyes during the Harlem Renaissance

Harlem Book of The Dead — As one of the very few Black photographers operating in the 20th century, James Van Der Zee’s sepia-tinged archive remains a crucial documentation of New York’s African American history. Now, one of his classic books, capturing funeral culture, is back in print.

  • Culture
  • Miss Rosen
Black and white image showing a group of shirtless men socialising, some laughing.

A visual trip through 100 years of New York’s LGBTQ+ spaces

Queer Happened Here — A new book from historian and writer Marc Zinaman maps scores of Manhattan’s queer venues and informal meeting places, documenting the city’s long LGBTQ+ history in the process.

  • Culture
  • Isaac Muk
Crowded festival site with tents, stalls and an illuminated red double-decker bus. Groups of people, including children, milling about on the muddy ground.
© Alan Tash Lodge

New documentary revisits the radical history of UK free rave culture

Free Party: A Folk History — Directed by Aaron Trinder, it features first-hand stories from key crews including DiY, Spiral Tribe, Bedlam and Circus Warp, with public streaming available from May 30.

  • Music
  • Isaac Muk

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