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Censorship in Australia

Certain subject-matter in Australia is subject to various forms of government censorship. These include matters of national security, judicial non-publication or suppression orders, defamation law, the federal Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (Cth), film and literature (including video game) classification, and advertising restrictions.

Some forms of censorship are not administered directly by the government or courts. For example, some foreign websites have on occasion been blocked by Australian internet service providers. More recently, concerns have been raised as to the level of academic freedom enjoyed at Australia's public universities. Outside of these matters, standards for television, radio, recorded music, the press and most commercial advertising are enforced, in the first instance, by means of industry self-regulation.

Legal protections
Australia does not have explicit freedom of speech in any constitutional or statutory declaration of rights, with the exception of political speech which is protected from criminal prosecution at common law per Australian Capital Television Pty Ltd v Commonwealth. There is however an "implied freedom of political communication" that was recognised in Lange v Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

In 1992 the High Court of Australia judged in the case of Australian Capital Television Pty Ltd v Commonwealth that the Australian Constitution, by providing for a system of representative and responsible government, implied the protection of political communication as an essential element of that system. This freedom of political communication is not a broad freedom of speech as in other countries, but rather a freedom that only protects political free speech. This freedom of political free speech is a shield against government prosecution, not a shield against private prosecution (civil law). It is also less a causal mechanism in itself, rather than simply a boundary which can be adjudged to be breached. Despite the court's ruling, however, not all political speech appears to be protected in Australia and several laws criminalise forms of speech that would be protected in republic countries such as the United States.

In 1996, Albert Langer was imprisoned for advocating that voters fill out their ballot papers in a way that was invalid. Amnesty International declared Langer to be a prisoner of conscience. The section which outlawed Langer from encouraging people to vote this way has since been repealed and the law now says only that it is an offence to print or publish material which may deceive or mislead a voter.

The Howard government expanded sedition law as part of the war on terror. Media Watch ran a series on the amendments on ABC television.

In 2003, CSIRO senior scientist Graeme Pearman was reprimanded and encouraged to resign after he spoke out on global warming. The Howard government was accused of limiting the speech of Pearman and other scientists.

In 2010, journalist Andrew Bolt was sued in the Federal Court over two posts on his Herald Sun blog in 2009. Bolt was found to have contravened the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (RDA) in 2011 following comments regarded to be representative of a "eugenic" approach to aboriginal identity. This prompted the federal government to propose changes to the Racial Discrimination Act but this has been met with stiff resistance.

In 2014 the Supreme Court of Victoria issued a blanket media gag order on the reporting of a high-profile international corruption case. The gag order prevented the publishing of articles regarding bribes presented to high-ranking officials of Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam by senior executives of the Reserve Bank of Australia in order to secure the adoption of the Australian invented and produced polymer banknote technology.

Australian Classification Board
Certain films, books and video games have, in effect, been banned from sale in Australia because they have been “refused classification” by the Australian Classification Board which was founded in 1970. Materials are generally refused classification because of explicit violent or sexual content.

Although the Australian Classification Board Guidelines state that "adults should be able to read, hear and see what they want", many books are apparently banned or given a restricted classification simply because they may offend certain segments of the population. Under particularly frequent attacks are books containing erotica, those concerning illegal drugs, and those discussing end-of-life issues (particularly those discussing or condoning assisted suicide). For example, in December 2006 the voluntary euthanasia book The Peaceful Pill Handbook was classified by the OFLC as X18+ and approved for publication. A month later, on appeal from the Australian Attorney General Philip Ruddock and Right to Life NSW, the book's classification was reviewed by the Literature Classification Board and rated RC (refused classification).

In 2000, Liberal Party of Australia Prime Minister John Howard had the Australian Classification Board prohibit depictions of certain sexual fetishes including candle wax, bondage, spanking, fisting, and golden showers. Sexually explicit depictions of adults who appeared to look under 18 years of age were also prohibited by the Board. The Australian Sex Party accused these actions of censoring depictions of female ejaculation and censoring adult women with small breasts.

Imports
In Australia, the importation of certain books, video games, and media are prohibited based on its non-fictional or fictional contents. It was reported on in 2021, that the Australian Border Force stated that any depictions of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime cruelty, violence, terrorist acts, or revolting content that offends moral standards and decency, are prohibited.

Book censorship until 1970
Book censorship has existed in Australia since the 19th century. Each state had its own legislation, including:
 * Obscene and Indecent Publications Act 1901 (later Indecent Articles and Publications Act 1975)
 * Police Offences Act 1958  (Victoria)
 * Indecent Publications and Articles Act 1902-1983 (Western Australia)

Norman Lindsay's Redheap was the first book to be banned from import into Australia, in May 1930, under the Commonwealth Customs Act 1901. This was before the establishment of the Commonwealth Book Censorship Board in 1933 by Prime Minister Joseph Lyons' United Australia Party, which was renamed the Literature Censorship Board in 1937. The novel Upsurge, written by J. M. Harcourt and published in 1934, became the first Australian book to be officially banned under the guidelines of the Commonwealth Book Censorship Board It was initially banned as seditious, later reviewed and the ban confirmed, ostensibly on grounds of indecency and explicit depictions of sex under the Indecent Publications Act. However the main cause of its ban was its socialist tone and subversive agenda which criticised capitalism, featuring Communist characters in its portrayal of life in the relief camps of the Depression.

In the 1960s, censorship laws came under pressure when "three intrepid Sydney activists," Alexander William Sheppard, Leon Fink and Ken Buckley, locally published D. H. Lawrence's The Trial of Lady Chatterley (Sydney, 1965), which was at that time banned in Australia, and Sheppard then published James Baldwin's Another Country (1966). In 1970, Penguin Books had three copies of Portnoy's Complaint smuggled into Australia and then secretly printed 75,000 copies of the book. In the early 1970s Don Chipp, the federal Minister of Customs and Excise, largely ended censorship of printed material in the country, with Australians being able to read such books as Portnoy’s Complaint and Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer.

Press freedom
Freedom House reported in 2021 that although Australia's "constitution does not explicitly protect press freedom, journalists scrutinise lawmakers and the government, covering controversial topics generally without serious obstacles or risk of harassment or violence." However, it expressed concern about two police raids conducted in 2019, and the widespread use of judicial suppression orders. Press freedom may also be affected by the provisions of defamation law and the Commonwealth RDA, which are discussed in the following sections.

Australia has been on a decline on the Press Freedom Index curated by the Reporters Without Borders, in reflection of rising media censorship and intimidation of journalists in the country, including media companies maintaining close ties to political leaders, fueling doubts about editorial independence. Two giant firms dominate mass media in Australia – Nine Entertainment and News Corp Australia, a subsidiary of American-based News Corp. The country was ranked 19th out of 180 countries in 2018, before subsequently dropping to 26th out of 180 countries for 2020 and 39th in 2022.

National security
The Australian Government has occasionally acted against media outlets for reasons of national security. In June 2019, federal police raided the Sydney offices of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the home of Sunday Telegraph political editor Annika Smethurst, seeking evidence against officials who may have leaked sensitive government information to journalists. Both raids were widely condemned in media and legal circles, and led to a review.

Suppression and non-publication orders
Commonwealth, State and territory law provides for the suppression or non-publication of certain information regarding legal proceedings. This can be to avoid contaminating the jury pool, or to protect the identities of children and sexual assault victims. While these orders are generally targeted at journalists, in the past the transmission of television crime dramas has been delayed as a result.

The case of Cardinal George Pell is one cited by Freedom House. The conviction of one of the Vatican's most senior officials made headlines around the world, yet a suppression order banned all Australian media outlets from reporting the story. The order was intended to avoid the verdict influencing a future trial involving separate charges (these were later dropped). Australians could, however, readily find the news on foreign websites. Melbourne's Herald Sun newspaper posted on its front page "CENSORED" in large print in protest of the ban, noting that international sources were reporting on a "very important story that is relevant to Victorians". Victorian authorities later charged 36 individual journalists and news organisations with breaching suppression orders related to the verdict.

Defamation
Australian law of defamation developed primarily out of the English law of defamation and its cases, though now there are differences introduced by statute and by the implied constitutional limitation on governmental powers to limit speech of a political nature established in Lange v Australian Broadcasting Corporation (1997).

On 10 December 2002, the High Court of Australia delivered judgment in the Internet defamation case of Dow Jones v Gutnick. The judgment established that internet-published foreign publications that defamed an Australian in their Australian reputation could be held accountable under Australian defamation law. The case gained worldwide attention and is often said, inaccurately, to be the first of its kind. A similar case that predates Dow Jones v Gutnick is Berezovsky v Forbes in England.

Among the various common law jurisdictions, some Americans have presented a visceral and vocal reaction to the Gutnick decision. On the other hand, the decision mirrors similar decisions in many other jurisdictions such as England, Scotland, France, Canada and Italy.

In 2006, uniform defamation laws came into effect across Australia. In addition to fixing the problematic inconsistencies in law between individual States and Territories, the laws made a number of changes to the common law position, including:

 * Abolishing the distinction between libel and slander.
 * Providing new defenses including that of triviality, where it is a defense to the publication of a defamatory matter if the defendant proves that the circumstances of publication were such that the plaintiff was unlikely to sustain any harm.
 * The defenses against defamation may be negated if there is proof the publication was actuated by malice.
 * Greatly restricting the right of corporations to sue for defamation (see e.g. Defamation Act 2005 (Vic), s 9). Corporations may, however, still sue for the tort of injurious falsehood, where the burden of proof is greater than in defamation, because the plaintiff must show that the defamation was made with malice and resulted in economic loss.

The 2006 reforms also established across all Australian states the availability of truth as an unqualified defense; previously a number of states only allowed a defense of truth with the condition that a public interest or benefit existed. The defendant however still needs to prove that the defamatory imputations are substantially true.

Advertising bans
Commonwealth and State governments ban or restrict certain types of advertising in order to maintain the integrity of elections, personal injury law and the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.

Personal injury lawyers
Lawyers in most Australian states are censored in respect of public statements they are allowed to publish concerning personal injury compensation law. Non-lawyers are also prohibited from publishing statements on the subject in some states. The laws are described as a ban on advertising of personal injury compensation but go much further.

The censorship must be self-administered, and breaches render a lawyer liable to prosecution, disbarment and, potentially, even jail. These laws coincided with the Insurance Crisis, the Ipp report and Civil Liability laws.

In New South Wales all lawyer public statements concerning personal injury compensation are prohibited.

Queensland
In Queensland television and radio advertising is banned and lawyer statements concerning personal injury compensation law must be censored so as to contain only:

 * The lawyer's name, contact details and area of speciality (print and other "allowed publications" only);
 * The operation of the law of negligence and a person's rights under that law (lawyers' websites only);
 * The lawyer's terms of service (lawyers' websites only).

The Queensland censorship provisions were originally intended to ban distasteful advertisements by some personal injury law firms that promoted "cash for injuries". The Queensland Attorney-General stated in his Second Reading speech when introducing the legislation in 2002 as follows:

The bill also better regulates provocative advertising by lawyers in relation to personal injury services ... the sort of advertising currently broadcast on radio and television does not enhance clients' rights or portray the profession in a particularly positive light.

Section 4 (2) (f) of the Queensland Act refers to "regulating inappropriate advertising..."

However the Queensland government has since given the censorship provisions the strictest possible interpretation and threatened hundreds of lawyers with prosecution.

One of the many outcomes that impact on freedom of expression and free speech is that concerning lawyers' web sites. A lawyer must not even list "personal injury" even merely as a link on a webpage that has no relation to the prohibited subject matter.

In practice, lawyers are prohibited from listing even on their website homepage some of the areas of law they practise in. Photos, images, slogans are prohibited. All references to personal injury compensation law must be censored out of website staff profiles containing anything more than the person's name, contact details and area of expertise.

Some other subject matter that must be censored out of web sites and other publications includes: winning verdicts and settlements; mention of the law firms reputation, expertise and history; testimonials; case histories; the standard of service and many other things that would allow consumers to differentiate among competitors.

The Queensland censorship provisions have not yet been judicially interpreted. It is unknown whether the ultra-strict interpretation contended for by the Queensland government will be upheld by a court.

New South Wales
In New South Wales, all statements by lawyers concerning personal injury compensation including on websites are banned and strict penalties apply. One lawyer has already been professionally punished and fined $20,000 for making a website statement.

The New South Wales version of the censorship law which is stricter than that of Queensland was considered by the High Court of Australia in 2005. The plaintiffs argued that the law was invalid because it infringed the implied constitutional freedom of political communication and secondly that it infringed Chapter III of the Constitution and the rule of law.

In a majority decision the court held that the New South Wales censorship law was valid. It did not accept that statements merely about personal injury compensation law were of a political nature. It implied however that any statements criticising the censorship itself and tort "reform" would be in the nature of political communication that was protected. The majority also ruled against the plaintiffs on the second argument (but the minority were strongly of the view) that the law unreasonably interfered with lawyers going about their constitutionally protected vocation.

On 20 June 2008, Justice Adams of the Supreme Court of NSW held that clause 34 of the Legal Profession Regulation 2005 which bans personal injury advertising in NSW by non-lawyers, was void because it was Ultra Vires the Legal Profession Act 2004.

Victoria
No censorship applies in Victoria.

Western Australia
The Western Australian censorship rules are similar to those in Queensland. However, television advertising is permitted by ACMA.

Consumer opposition
The Australian Lawyers Alliance opposes the censorship and believes that "content-rich statements" concerning the availability of all legal services are in the public interest.

Consumer groups (e.g. Tort Reform Institute, Insurance Reform) argue that any restriction on lawyer communication is adverse to the public interest. They argue that the public should be fully informed about their rights particularly under consumer protection laws that generate compensation payments, and that censorship that keeps the public under-informed cannot be justified. In their view, the protection of insurance company profits is not a sufficient "public purpose" to warrant the interference in personal freedoms by way of censorship. The ultimate aim of the government and insurers, according to such consumer groups, is to eliminate the expression "personal injury compensation" from the Australian vocabulary and to dissuade citizens from exercising compensation rights by making it "distasteful" to do so.

Exceptions to the censorship provision apply to:

 * Insurance companies, who are permitted to advertise that personal injury claims can be made directly with them; or
 * Statements concerning the defence of personal injury claims as opposed to the pursuit of those claims (except in New South Wales)

Internet censorship
Some activists consider Australia's laws on Internet censorship to be amongst the most restrictive in the western world. However, the restrictive nature of the laws has been combined with almost complete lack of interest in enforcement from the agencies responsible.

Some of the interesting exceptions include an attempt by then NSW Police Minister Michael Costa to shut down Melbourne Indymedia, a case in 2001 involving the US Secret Service that was eventually pleaded out, and an attempt by the FBI using the Australian Federal Police to censor a Victorian they alleged was posting threats to the US.

A collection of both federal and state laws apply, but the most important is the federal legislation which came into effect on 1 January 2000.

If a complaint is issued about material on the Internet, the ACMA is empowered to examine the material under the guidelines for film and video. If it is found that a) the material would be classified X18+, or b) the material would classified R18+ and the site does not have an adult verification system, or c) the material would be refused classification:

 * If the site is hosted in Australia, the ACMA is empowered to issue a "takedown notice" under which the material must be removed from the site.
 * If the site is hosted outside Australia, the site is added to a list of banned sites.

This list of banned sites is then added to filtering software, which must be offered to all consumers by Internet Service Providers and the Australian Government.

On 31 December 2007 the Telecommunications Minister of the newly elected Labor government, Stephen Conroy, announced that Australia would introduce mandatory internet filtering. Once more the reason given is that mandatory filtering is required to "provide greater protection to children from online pornography and violent websites".

As of November 2008, the plan includes two blacklists, one of which will filter illegal content according to internet content laws as well as other "unwanted" content, and the other will also filter content unsuitable for children. Internet users will be able to opt out of the secondary blacklist for children, but will not be able to opt out of the primary filter, sparking free speech concerns. No statement has been made about what content will be considered "illegal", or what Stephen Conroy means by "unwanted".

Slated for blocking, should the "Clean Feed" Act be passed by Australia's Federal Parliament, is the website of Dr Philip Nitschke's banned book, The Peaceful Pill Handbook. The inclusion of Nitschke's euthanasia book's website came to light after the Government's list of would-be banned websites was leaked to wikileaks.org. The Peaceful Pill Handbook was listed on the leaked internet website blacklist, wedged in alphabetical order between the porn sites panty-ass.com and pickyourperversion.com.

This produced a huge backlash from the community, including the Get Up advertisement Censordyne. Conroy eventually abandoned the proposal, saying that the relevant authority was already invested in ACMA, which didn't take any action in accordance.

Since the election of the Coalition government in 2013, there has been one act passed, that allows the blocking of websites that host pirated content, if the content provider has contacted the Australian government about it and they've gone through the procedures set out through the act, then the website will be blocked under s.115a of the Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Bill 2015.

There has been two applications to Section.115a, one by Foxtel and another by Village Roadshow, which would prohibit an Australian pirate site from functioning and block The Pirate Bay respectively. The Federal Court has recently ruled that ISP's must block a range of Torrent sites including The Pirate Bay using either DNS Hijacking, URL blocking or some other mutually agreed method by ISPs and rights holders.

There are some reports said Australia has also been collaborating with Chinese Great Firewall security officials and other officials from Cyberspace Administration of China in implementing its data retention and filtering infrastructure and possibly obtained surveillance technology from China.

On 20 March 2019 Australian telecom company Telstra denied access to millions of Australians to the websites 4chan, 8chan, Zero Hedge, Voat, Archive.today, and Liveleak as a reaction to the Christchurch mosque shootings.

Universities
Concerns have been expressed by Freedom House and others about protections for freedom of speech and academic freedom at Australia's universities. In 2018, the Australian Government asked former Chief Justice Robert French to conduct an independent review of freedom of speech and academic freedom in Australian higher education. While French disagreed that there was a "freedom of speech crisis" on campuses, he nonetheless noted the risks to freedom posed by the various and vaguely-worded protections then in place. Concerns include the influence of the People's Republic of China on university administrations; 'deplatforming' of controversial speakers and viewpoints; and demands that academics refrain from contesting one another's conclusions.

Deplatforming
Many Australian university campuses have seen protests by students and faculty against unorthodox or controversial viewpoints. Several universities refused to host Copenhagen Consensus or Ramsay research centres following left-wing protests.

Internal criticism
Another threat is action by universities to silence internal criticism. In 2016, James Cook University sacked marine scientist Peter Ridd for publishing an article questioning the reproducibility of his colleagues' work on the Great Barrier Reef. The Federal Court later ruled the University had acted unlawfully, awarding Ridd more than $1 million in damages.

Advertising boycotts
Campaigners including the anonymous American group Sleeping Giants have attempted to force certain conservative and libertarian commentators off Australian radio and television by threatening to boycott broadcasters' advertisers. Targets of this approach have included both hosts, such as radio presenter Alan Jones and former Northern Territory Chief Minister Adam Giles, and guests, such as former senator David Leyonhjelm.

Advertising standards
Standards for commercial advertising in Australia are enforced via industry self-regulation.

title: Censorship in Australia


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User talk:Rudolph~enwiki

Hello Rudolph and welcome to Wikipedia. It looks like you would have benefited from the timely addition of my standard user greeting to your user page, which is:

 * Peruse Welcome, newcomers and associated pages
 * Sign talk page entries with ~, which is automatically converted to a name and date
 * Ask questions on Village pump
 * Have fun.

I have answered your question on Reference desk, but I don't want to leave it there for long, so tell me when you've seen it.

-- Tim Starling 07:51 10 Jul 2003 (UTC)

George III
I answered you on my talk page, here by Snowolf (talk) on  19:51, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, it seems that the user I was looking for was Rodolph not Rudolph ;-) by Snowolf (talk) on  19:57, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Your account will be renamed
Hello,

The developer team at Wikimedia is making some changes to how accounts work, as part of our on-going efforts to provide new and better tools for our users like cross-wiki notifications. These changes will mean you have the same account name everywhere. This will let us give you new features that will help you edit and discuss better, and allow more flexible user permissions for tools. One of the side-effects of this is that user accounts will now have to be unique across all 900 Wikimedia wikis. See the announcement for more information.

Unfortunately, your account clashes with another account also called Rudolph. To make sure that both of you can use all Wikimedia projects in future, we have reserved the name Rudolph~enwiki that only you will have. If you like it, you don't have to do anything. If you do not like it, you can pick out a different name. If you think you might own all of the accounts with this name and this message is in error, please visit Special:MergeAccount to check and attach all of your accounts to prevent them from being renamed.

Your account will still work as before, and you will be credited for all your edits made so far, but you will have to use the new account name when you log in.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Yours, Keegan Peterzell Community Liaison, Wikimedia Foundation 02:29, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Renamed
 This account has been renamed as part of single-user login finalisation. If you own this account you can |log in using your previous username and password for more information. If you do not like this account's new name, you can choose your own using this form after logging in: . -- Keegan (WMF) (talk) 18:18, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: User talk:Rudolph~enwiki


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Westfalia

Westfalia is the designation of various specially converted Volkswagen camper vans. Westfalia is named after the company, Westfalia-Werke, the contractor that built the vans, headquartered in the town of Rheda-Wiedenbrück, located in the Westphalia region of Germany.

Products
Westfalia-Werke also converted non-Volkswagen vans and produced camping trailers and other products, but they were best known for their Volkswagen camper conversions. Westfalia began converting Volkswagen buses in 1951. Their famous "pop-top" package was added later and became very popular on the second-generation VW Bus from 1968 to 1979, and its successor the Vanagon (also calle Westy and Campmobile), the Sven Hedin and Florida conversions on the Volkswagen LT, and then the T4 EuroVan, which was discontinued in 2003. This design also inspired many imitators, with dozens of other companies worldwide offering pop-top van conversions. Therefore, not all pop-top Volkswagens are Westfalia conversions, although in the United States, the Westfalia conversion was by far the most common. Conversely, not all Volkswagen Westfalia conversions had pop-tops or cooking facilities. Volkswagen offered a "Weekender" package in the 1970s with a Westfalia interior, but no pop-top. Later, some Vanagon conversions were offered with a pop-top and interior table, but lacked cooking facilities and instead included a luggable 12-volt refrigerator.

In 1999, DaimlerChrysler purchased a 49% stake in Westfalia-Werke's van conversion division, and in 2001 absorbed the remaining 51%. Of course, since DaimlerChrysler is a Volkswagen competitor, this spelled the end of the Volkswagen-Westfalia partnership. Volkswagen still offers pop-top camper conversions in Europe, which are made in-house since 2005. Vans leave the Transporter/Multivan assembly line and are moved to a dedicated facility to be converted into Californias, in Ocean, Coast, or Beach versions. Meanwhile, Westfalia now makes Mercedes Marco Polo pop-top vans, as well as larger Sprinter high-roof — factory camper conversions for Mercedes vans, distributed in the United States by Airstream and badged as Dodge Sprinters. They also provide automotive accessories to BMW, including trailer hitches.

In 2008, a management buyout occurred and Westfalia Van Conversion is now an independent entity. It still converts some vehicles for major car manufacturers to sell through their own networks, such as the Ford Nugget, but also markets conversions through its own network of recreational vehicle dealers. These models include the Ford-based Big Nugget, Volkswagen Crafter-based Sven Hedin, and the Michelangelo. The Michelangelo vehicle uses a Fiat Scudo chassis and is designed to be a major competitor to the Volkswagen California. Westfalia has recently returned to making their own conversions of Volkswagen Transporter vans, in direct competition with the Volkswagen California.

On 28 January 2010, Westfalia-Werke filed for bankruptcy, citing a 40 percent drop in sales. According to the filing, they would like to keep doing business while they restructure. Westfalia was acquired by the Rapido group in 2011.

title: Westfalia


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1850 in science

The year 1850 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Biology

 * May 25 – The young Hippopotamous Obaysch arrives at London Zoo from Egypt, the first seen in Europe since Roman times.
 * Rewilding of Ascension Island begins.

Chemistry

 * April 15 – Capt. John William Reynolds presents his discovery of propylene.
 * October 17 – James Young patents a method of distilling kerosene from coal.
 * Rev. Levi Hill invents a color photography process, "helicromy", capable of basic rendering of reds and blues.

Mathematics

 * July 2 – William Thomson communicates Stokes' theorem to George Stokes. Stokes presents a paper on the numerical calculation of a class of definite integrals and infinite series.
 * Thomas Kirkman proposes Kirkman's schoolgirl problem.
 * Victor Puiseux distinguishes between poles and branch points and introduces the concept of essential singular points.
 * J. J. Sylvester originates the term matrix in mathematics.

Medicine

 * March – Dr Benjamin Guy Babington founds the London Epidemiological Society.
 * Central Criminal Lunatic Asylum for Ireland opened in Dundrum, Dublin, the first secure hospital in Europe.

Meteorology

 * April 3 – British Meteorological Society founded.

Physics

 * May – John Tyndall and Hermann Knoblauch publish a report on "The magneto-optic properties of crystals, and the relation of magnetism and diamagnetism to molecular arrangement".
 * Rudolf Clausius publishes his paper on the mechanical theory of heat, which first states the basic ideas of the second law of thermodynamics.
 * Hippolyte Fizeau and E. Gounelle measure the speed of electricity.
 * Léon Foucault demonstrates the greater speed of light in air than in water, and establishes that the speed of light in different media is inverse to the refractive indices of the media, using a rotating mirror.
 * George Stokes publishes a paper on the effects of the internal friction of fluids on the motion of pendulums.

Technology

 * April 15 – Angers Bridge, a French suspension bridge, collapses in a storm with around 480 soldiers marching across it; about 226 are killed.
 * July 14 – John Gorrie makes the first public demonstration of his ice-making machine, in Apalachicola, Florida.
 * Completion of the Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève in Paris to the design of Henri Labrouste, the first major public building with an exposed cast-iron frame.

Institutions

 * Astronomer Maria Mitchell becomes the first woman member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
 * The University of Oxford in England establishes an Honour School (i.e. an undergraduate course) in Natural Science.

Awards

 * Copley Medal: Peter Andreas Hansen
 * Wollaston Medal: William Hopkins

Births

 * January 5 – Sidney Browne (died – 1941), British military nurse.
 * January 15 (January 3 O.S.) – Sofia Kovalevskaya (died 1891), Russian-born mathematician.
 * January 24 – Hermann Ebbinghaus (died 1909), German psychologist.
 * January 29 – Edmond Nocard (died 1903), French veterinarian and microbiologist.
 * February 15 – Sophie Bryant (died 1922), Irish-born mathematician and educationalist.
 * March 31 – Charles Walcott (died 1927), American paleontologist.
 * April 10 – Mary Emilie Holmes (died 1906), American geologist and educator.
 * May 18 – Oliver Heaviside (died 1925), English physicist.
 * May 21 – Giuseppe Mercalli (died 1914), Italian volcanologist.
 * May 23 – George Claridge Druce (died 1932), English botanist.
 * June 6 – Karl Ferdinand Braun (died 1918), German-born physicist.
 * August 30 – Charles Richet (died 1935), French physiologist, Nobel Prize winner.

Deaths

 * March 27 – Wilhelm Beer (born 1797), German astronomer.
 * April 9 – William Prout (born 1785), English chemist.
 * May 10 – Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac (born 1778), French chemist and physicist.
 * July 12 – Robert Stevenson (born 1772), Scottish lighthouse engineer.
 * August 5 – Mary Anne Whitby (born 1783), English scientist.
 * December 4 – William Sturgeon (born 1783), English inventor.

title: 1850 in science


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1824 in science

The year 1824 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Astronomy

 * Franz von Paula Gruithuisen explains the formation of craters on the Moon as a result of meteorite impacts.
 * William Pearson publishes An Introduction to Practical Astronomy.

Biology

 * John Curtis begins publication of British Entomology in London.
 * Thomas Say begins publication of American Entomology, or Descriptions of the Insects of North America in Philadelphia, including the first description of the Colorado potato beetle.

Climatology

 * Joseph Fourier calculates that the Earth would be far colder if it lacked an atmosphere.

Mathematics

 * Niels Henrik Abel partially proves that the general quintic or higher equations cannot be solved by a general formula involving only arithmetical operations and roots.
 * Augustin-Louis Cauchy proves convergence of the Euler method, using the implicit Euler method.

Paleontology

 * The Rev. Professor William Buckland becomes the first person to describe a dinosaur in a scientific journal.

Technology

 * October 21 – Patent issued to Joseph Aspdin for Portland cement.
 * Sadi Carnot scientifically analyzes the efficiency of steam engines and heat engines in general in his book Reflections on the Motive Power of Fire and on Machines Fitted to Develop that Power ("Réflexions sur la puissance motrice du feu et sur les machines propres à développer cette puissance").
 * Louis Braille, at age 15, develops the six-dot code, later known as Braille, which allows the visually impaired to read and write faster than previous raised-letter systems.
 * The Panoramagram is invented as the first stereoscopic viewer.

Institutions

 * January 8 – After much controversy, Michael Faraday is finally elected as a member of the Royal Society with only one vote against him.
 * February 5 – The Franklin Institute of the State of Pennsylvania for the Promotion of the Mechanic Arts is founded in Philadelphia by Samuel Vaughan Merrick and William H. Keating.
 * November 5 – Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the first technological university in the English-speaking world, is founded in Troy, New York.

Awards

 * Copley Medal: John Brinkley

Births

 * February 7 – William Huggins (died 1910), astronomer.
 * February 16 – Peter Kosler (died 1879), cartographer, geographer.
 * March 12 – Gustav Kirchhoff (died 1887), physicist.
 * May 18 – Wilhelm Hofmeister (died 1877), botanist.
 * June 26 – William Thomson (died 1907), Lord Kelvin, physicist.
 * June 28 – Paul Broca (died 1880), anthropologist.
 * December 11 – Jonathan Letterman (died 1872), surgeon and "Father of Battlefield Medicine".

Deaths

 * December 21 – James Parkinson (born 1755), surgeon.

title: 1824 in science


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User talk:Sedorr

Please don't create "articles" that only have a picture in them. Provide at least a one sentence definition telling the reader who they are looking at. --mav

Hello there, welcome to the 'pedia! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. If you need pointers on how we title pages visit Naming conventions or how to format them visit our manual of style. If you have any other questions about the project then check out Help or add a question to the Village pump. Cheers! --maveric149

Unverified images
Hi! Thanks for uploading the following image:

 * Image:Edward_Porter_Alexander.jpg

I notice it currently doesn't have an image copyright tag. Could you add one to let us know its copyright status? (You can use if you release it under the GNU Free Documentation License,  if you wish to release your own work to the public domain,  if you claim fair use, etc.) If you don't know what any of this means, just let me know at my talk page where you got the images and I'll tag them for you. Thanks so much. Peter O. (Talk, automation script) 05:50, Dec 25, 2004 (UTC)

P.S. You can help tag other images at User:Yann/Untagged_Images. Thanks again.

title: User talk:Sedorr


text:
Kensington Gore

Kensington Gore is the name of a U-shaped thoroughfare on the south side of Hyde Park in the City of Westminster, England. The streets connect the Royal Albert Hall with the Royal College of Art, the Royal Geographical Society, and in Kensington Gardens the Albert Memorial. The area is named after the Gore estate which occupied the site until it was developed by Victorian planners in the mid 19th century. A gore is a narrow, triangular piece of land. "the wedge-shaped piece of land which divides them, and which has been known from Anglo-Saxon times as The Gore." The street replaces part of Kensington Road, connecting what would otherwise be two separate streets.

History
Gore House was the residence of political reformer William Wilberforce between 1808 and 1821. The three-acre (12,000 m2) estate was subsequently occupied by the Countess of Blessington and the Count D'Orsay from 1836 to 1849.

In May 1851, the house opened as a restaurant by the chef Alexis Soyer, who planned to cater for the 1851 Great Exhibition in Hyde Park. After the exhibition and on the advice of Prince Albert, Gore House and its grounds were bought by the Exhibition's Royal Commission to create the cultural quarter known as Albertopolis. In 1871, the Royal Albert Hall was completed on the site of the former house. It was opened by Queen Victoria.

In 1892, The Gore Hotel was opened by sisters Miss Ada and Ms Cooke, descendants of Captain James Cook. The 50-bedroom luxury hotel has featured in many music videos and photo shoots, such as for Beggars Banquet by The Rolling Stones.

The streets are bounded to the north by Kensington Road (the A315). The nearest tube station is South Kensington to the south.

title: Kensington Gore


text:
User:Rudolph~enwiki

 * Name : Rudolph Froger
 * Country : the Netherlands
 * URL : http://www.estrate.nl

I have special interest in internet related technologies.

Rudolph 22:08 2 Jan 2008 (CET)

title: User:Rudolph~enwiki


text:
1881 in science

The year 1881 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Astronomy

 * 22 May – John Tebbutt discover the long-period comet, C/1881 K1 (also known as the Great Comet of 1881, Comet Tebbutt, 1881 III, 1881b).

Biology

 * October – Charles Darwin publishes his last scientific book The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms.
 * L. S. Poliakov describes the wild horse discovered by Nikolai Przhevalsky in Mongolia in 1879 as a new species, Przewalski's Horse (Equus przewalski poliakov).
 * The first systematic study in forensic entomology is conducted by physician and entomologist Hermann Reinhard in Germany.

Chemistry

 * Friedrich Beilstein publishes the first edition of his Handbuch der organischen Chemie.

History of science and technology

 * The birch bark Bakhshali manuscript, incorporating perhaps the earliest known use of mathematical zero, is unearthed near Bakhshali in British India.
 * Publication in England of a pioneering study in industrial archaeology, H. A. Fletcher's "The archaeology of the west Cumberland iron trade".

Mathematics

 * Simon Newcomb makes the first statement of Benford's law.

Medicine

 * July 13 – Dr. George Goodfellow performs the first laparotomy to remove a bullet.
 * September 25 – The first modern Caesarean section is performed successfully by German gynecologist Ferdinand Adolf Kehrer in Meckesheim using the transverse incision technique.
 * December – Eduard von Hofmann carries out autopsy studies of the nearly 400 victims of the Vienna Ringtheater fire, carbon monoxide poisoning being held an underlying cause of death.
 * Louis Pasteur discovers a vaccine for anthrax.
 * Carlos Finlay, a Cuban doctor, first proposes that yellow fever is transmitted by mosquitoes rather than direct human contact.
 * French obstetrician Étienne Stéphane Tarnier introduces a form of neonatal incubator (couveuse) for routine care of premature infants at the Paris Maternité.
 * English ophthalmologist Waren Tay publishes the first description of the genetic disorder which will become known as Tay–Sachs disease.
 * approx. date – The non-invasive sphygmomanometer, for the measurement of blood pressure, is invented by Samuel Siegfried Karl von Basch.

Technology

 * March 1 – The Cunard Line's SS Servia, the first steel transatlantic liner, is launched at J. & G. Thomson's yard at Clydebank in Scotland.
 * May 16 – The Gross-Lichterfelde Tramway, the world's first electric tramway, is opened in Berlin by Siemens & Halske.
 * June – The positive-buoyancy powered submarine "Fenian Ram" (Holland Boat No. II), designed by John Philip Holland, is first submersion-tested in New York City.
 * September 26 – Godalming in England becomes the first town to have its streets illuminated by electric light (hydroelectrically generated).
 * October 10 – Richard D'Oyly Carte's Savoy Theatre opens in London, the world's first public building to be fully lit by electricity, using Joseph Swan's incandescent light bulbs. The stage is first lit electrically on December 28.
 * December 21 – SS Aberdeen (1881), the first oceangoing ship successfully powered by a triple expansion steam engine, designed by Alexander Carnegie Kirk, is launched at Robert Napier and Sons' yard at Govan in Scotland.
 * Peter Herdic patents the Herdic horse-drawn cab in the United States.

Awards

 * Copley Medal: Karl Adolph Wurtz
 * Wollaston Medal for Geology: Peter Martin Duncan

Births

 * January 29 – Alice Catherine Evans (died 1975), American microbiologist.
 * January 31 – Irving Langmuir (died 1957), American chemist.
 * March 17 – Walter Rudolf Hess (died 1973), Swiss physiologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
 * April 28 – Edith A. Roberts (died 1977), American plant ecologist.
 * May 1 – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (died 1955), French paleontologist and philosopher.
 * August 6 – Alexander Fleming (died 1955), British bacteriologist.
 * September 18 – Vera Lebedeva (died 1968), Soviet Russian pediatrician.
 * October 4 – George Constantinescu (died 1965), Romanian engineer.
 * October 11 – Lewis Fry Richardson (died 1953), British mathematical physicist.
 * October 22 – Clinton Davisson (died 1958), American physicist.
 * November 9 – Margaret Reed Lewis (died 1970), American cell biologist.
 * November 13 – Ludwig Koch (died 1974), German Jewish animal sound recordist.

Deaths

 * February 3 – John Gould (born 1804), English zoologist.
 * March 26 – Lovisa Åhrberg (born 1801), Swedish surgeon.
 * May 14 – Mary Seacole (born 1805), Jamaican-born nurse.
 * May 19 – Joseph Barnard Davis (born 1801), English craniologist, physician and anthropologist.
 * May 26 – Jakob Bernays (born 1824), German philologist.
 * June 16 – George Rolleston (born 1829), English physician and zoologist.
 * June 23 – Matthias Jakob Schleiden (born 1804), German biologist.
 * June 29 – Maurice Raynaud (born 1834), French physician.
 * July 27 – Hewett Watson (born 1804), English biologist.
 * October 31 – George W. DeLong (born 1844), American Arctic explorer.
 * November 30 – Jean-Alfred Gautier (born 1793), Swiss astronomer

title: 1881 in science


text:
User talk:Arpingstone/ArchiveJuly10-2003

Hi Adrian,

re the images on Irish Houses of Parliament, unfortunately italics is a disaster because one browser in one version (Internet Explorer of course, who else!) turns them particularly when small into barely legible spiderly writing. I put the captions in in the way they are because they were the only way I could get didn't produce this effect. As to alternation, I've moved some but that too is highly problematical because some images interfere with headlines. That problem occurs on some versions of netscape because it does not recognise the command and so text laid out as small which work perfectly on most browsers grow to full size on some versions of netscape, throwing everything all over the place and indenting some headlines, as well as crashing into other images if they are anyway close. (In putting on a lot of images with captions lately I have run into those problems over and over and over again and had to avoid the practice. Unless we get everyone to collectively bin IE and netscape - and oh god I wish they would. Of all the browsers I have used they are by far the worst! - italics (which I love using in professional documents I lay out) is a problem and alternation of pictures needs to be used very sparingly, and not with the  commands unless there are a clear two paragraphs between a left indent and the next headline. Even then all sorts of additional problems occur. I found these problems when using IE, then Netscape as a replacement. (I now use safari which is 100 times better!) I thought it was just a problem with my version of them, but others reported that different versions also produced the same problems. For some reason, it seems on netscape the newer the version the more it tends to screw up wiki images, or so I was told when I mentioned my problems. Older versions seemed not to have a problem. As one person joked, it seems bizarre that in every version of that damned browser they produce, things get worse not better! ÉÍREman 19:28 May 11, 2003 (UTC)

Sounds like you're going to have lots of aircraft pictures to add after last weekend, eh? :) -- John Owens 09:00 16 May 2003 (UTC)
 * There won't be many aircraft articles to illustrate because lots of the aircraft I photographed last weekend at Kemble (in south west England) have no Wikipedia entry. I took 360 pics (!) at the Kemble Great Vintage Fly-in Weekend where four hundred British vintage light aircraft were on display. The first one I've added is a Piper Super Cub, look at The New Piper Aircraft, which was in a hangar at the time. I used up two 128 megabyte Smart Media cards on my digital camera, each card holds 180 pictures. Thanks for your interest, Best Wishes, Adrian Pingstone 15:03 16 May 2003 (UTC)

 * I think it's perfectly reasonable, Adrian. The distinction between a DC-9 and an MD-88, as you know, is more semantic than real, and as I recall the text of the entry takes the sensble line that they should all be regarded as one big family of aircraft. So go right ahead! Nice to hear that you have lots of nice new photographs. Maybe I can get my head out of the mammals long enough to write you a type entry or two to put them in. Cheers -- Tannin

 * Woops! I thought I had written a great long article to go there! Must be thinking of DC-8. No matter, the entry will take that line, once I get around to writing it. Tannin

 * Nice picture (as always). I have always thought that the DC-9 was one of the best looking commercial aircraft ever made. Nothing unusual or radical, they just got the proportions exactly right somehow. Tannin

-

The Peacock's Display

Just saw the large peacock photo by you. I've never seen peacocks so close in the zoos. This photo of yours is doubtlessly the most professional I've seen on WP so far. Because of this photo, I plan to translate the peacock article into Chinese. --Menchi 10:17 25 May 2003 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your kind comment, much appreciated. I am just an amateur photographer with only a mid range digital camera but I have a firm rule that I will only put my best photos on Wikipedia and only if I have a large version as well. Nowadays, I do the big one 750 pixels wide so that an 800 pixel wide screen is not overwhelmed. The little one I do at 300 pixels wide so that text can flow down the side. The peacock was roaming free on an island in Poole harbour in south western England and was displaying to a female (not to me!) Best Wishes Adrian Pingstone 10:44 25 May 2003 (UTC)

Replied to your query on my talk page as requested. jimfbleak 10:37 27 May 2003 (UTC)

Thanks for your good work at Clifton Suspension Bridge. I thought the new versions were a bit too light when I looked at them at home, but on my monitor at work they're just right and my versions are horribly dark! The 750px versions look a bit fuzzy to me (you must have blown them up from my 600px versions), so I will go back to my original scans (nearly 4000px wide), try to recreate what you've done, and we'll see whether it produces any real improvement this evening. --rbrwr

 * You are quite right, I should have left the big pic at 600px wide. I blew it up to 750 px which was probably not a good idea. I did the blow up because I've standardised on a 750px pic, a size that doesn't overwhelm an 800 by 600 screen and is obviously OK at higher resolutions as well. I did all the processing in Photoshop. For your interest, I've discovered that any embedded thumbnail over 300px wide can squeeze the surrounding text down to just a few words in width, on an 800 by 600 screen (I use 1024 by 768). The effect is particularly serious if the reader has their Preferences set to have a menu down the left hand side. That's why I use 300px. All the articles I've illustrated are listed at User:Arpingstone
 * Cheers! Adrian Pingstone 08:28 28 May 2003 (UTC)

 * Well, I've given it a go, and the first file is up at Image:Clifton.bridge.745pix.jpg - my version ended up a little darker in the sky but lighter on the bridge. Does it look Ok to you? It's definitely sharper, but is close to half the file size. Mine's not as rotated as yours, either. I'm still not sure what I should take to be a correct vertical in the image... --rbrwr

 * Excellent picture, I don't see any need to change it any more. I took my vertical as a line through the bridge pier but I was being too fussy and the tiny lean really doesn't matter. Best Wishes Adrian Pingstone 08:04 29 May 2003 (UTC)

 * Thanks. I'll upload the other one tonight. --rbrwr

Thanks for the tip on portrait format, Adrian - I'd already spotted the 250 and 600 px sizes as you will see from University of Bristol... --rbrwr

Yes, I was a little unsure about the tilt on the university tower myself. I came to the conclusion that it's close enough to the angle where the nearest vertical edge of the tower (which goes right up the middle of the picture) should appear exactly vertical, and cropped it that way. By the way, today's uploads are the product of having got up bright and early on bank holiday Monday. --rbrwr

In response to your question, I'm using Photoshop 5.0LE for Windows, which came free with some piece of kit (scanner? printer? both?). Most of my recent JPEGs have been saved with quality setting 7 and "baseline optimised" format. I have picked up a few tips from Philip & Alex, of which I think the use of unsharp mask is the one making the difference that you can see - it artificially emphasises the edges of things a bit. When working with my own photos I also have the advantage of always cropping and rotating the high-quality original before I resize it. Hope that helps... --rbrwr
 * Good reply, thanks for the hints. That website is most interesting. Thanks again, Best Wishes Adrian Pingstone 12:10 1 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I notice you like putting pictures on articles. I was just wondering is their any chance that you could find a picture to go on the Thrust 2 and Thrust SSC articles. By-the-way where do you get your pictures from. G-Man 2/6/03
 * I'm sorry I can't answer properly for 2 days but my computer is going for repair. I promise I will answer you when it comes back.
 * Adrian Pingstone 15:13 3 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * Hi! My pics come from the following sources:
 * My own digital photography.
 * Long hours searching the internet using Google (I'm retired).
 * US sources such as NOAA, NASA, Navy, Army and Air Force.
 * The Canadian Air Force (I no longer use the Australian Air Force, I think their copyright message is too restricting for Wikipedia).
 * I have two photographers who let me use the pics off their sites.

 * That's it! The easy way to see exactly where a pic comes from is simply to click on it. I always explain, in great detail, my source.
 * I've added two ThrustSSC pics but got in a mess trying to correct a mistake you made. You called them Thrust SSC and Thrust 2 (which is wrong, it's ThrustSSC and Thrust2). So I made a Redirect from Thrust SSC and Thrust 2 to the correct titles but now, when I put Thrust SSC or Thrust 2 into the Search box there's no result and I can't understand what I did wrong.
 * Best Wishes Adrian Pingstone 14:04 6 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Just out of curiosity, you seem to have been around the British aircraft biz a bit, albeit seemingly mostly on the civilian side... ever been to RAF Brize-Norton? -- John Owens 10:32 6 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * No, I haven't been to Brize, even though it's only about 40 miles from where I live. My interest has been photography at Heathrow since I bought a digital (Olympus 3020Z) camera about a year ago. For your interest, Brize has 19 VC10s, 8 Tristars and 4 C17s. Lyenham (about the same distance from me) has 51 C130s. I love illustrating Wikipedia and I cast about endlessly over the net for public domain pics (now that I've used up all the pics I've taken myself). I won't use any poor images so it's a hard search (but fun). Luckily I've got double speed broadband (1 megabyte cable) compared to the 56K dialup I used to have (and I'm retired) so I have loads of time for the searches.
 * Best Wishes Adrian Pingstone 13:33 6 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * Huh, the C-17s are new. I asked because that's where I was stationed for about a month during the Kosovo dust-up, working on KC-135s that went there. I definitely remember the VC-10s, since those were our equivalent there, but I'd have noticed C-17s if they'd been there then. One of the curious aspects of that time was getting visits from one of the big Antonovs, I forget exactly which one, complete with the Russian tricolour on it. That seemed a little weird. ;)
 * Unfortunately, I'm still among the digital-camera-lacking unwashed, and to top it off, some of my prints are in storage (and I didn't have a huge store to begin with). So I'm waiting to use a friend's scanner sometime, and then I should have a couple of decent pictures to add. -- John Owens 21:26 6 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I've moved your photo comments onto my talk page. CGS 17:32 11 Jun 2003 (UTC).

Sistine Chapel ceiling
I showed my little sister in first-grade those photos, and she exclaimed, "How did he take those so close? Did he stand up there, like a spider or something?!" :-) --Menchi 20:57 14 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Didn't really take that long at all, I just used search and replace.

I've been kind of torn in such instances whether I should be replacing with &rdquot; etc., but I finally guessed it would probably be better to go with uniformity with most of the other articles. - Hephaestos 20:51 15 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hi Adrian. I think this link to Swarovski ought to answer your question. :) I have heaps more on this stuff if you are interested. -- Beat Tannin

Adrian, I was using a different computer from my normal one the other day and I looked at those Winchester Cathedral photos, and suddendly mine did seem to be very dark. I always thought the PNG format compensated for this problem with a gamma correction field. I'm going to switch them (upload yours into mine). CGS 17:58 19 Jun 2003 (UTC).

Hi Arpingstone, I find the image of the Austrian town Kaprun really nice, but why did you put it on the "Austria" page? I don't see any relation to the article. Fantasy 08:11 20 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * moved discussion to talk:Austria Fantasy 09:18 20 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hi Adrian, again me. Another question: It seems to me, that you are (apart from airplanes) also interrested in cableways, Aerial tramways and things like that. Are you often in Austria, have you been also in South Tyrol? Are you also interrested in trains? Fantasy 10:06 20 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * Hi Adrian, thanks for your reply on my page. I had just some friends from England that are interrested in trains and things like that, for this my question. I think this is a really good job, you are doing. A lot of the people that add "knowledge" to Wikipedia forget that you have also to enjoy the reading, and facts alone are "dry" ;-)  I look forward for many other fotos you add to Wikipedia. Have fun with you digicam, I think i will learn from you and also start to add my private fotos to Wikipedia! Greetings from Germany,  Fantasy 14:44 20 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hi Adrian, saw your query re duck names. Individual species capitalised throughout apart from hyphenated bits, eg Barrow's Goldeneye, Green-winged Teal, but for article titles there must be a lower case redirect to the capitalised version. Groups of birds not capitalised. eg the water kingfishers, the tree swifts. Scientific names as Anas crecca. Any queries, get back to me or Tannin,   jimfbleak 05:30 23 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hm, that's odd. I was using css to get the text smaller, but I guess IE's not picking it up. I went ahead and put it back to smaller in HTML, if you would have a look and make sure it works now that would be great. (Either css or html works in my browser; unfortunately I've done quite a few pages the css way, but I'll switch to the html tags from now on.) I put the parentheses in to differentiate between the rest of the text for flow, but I'm not adamant about it, if you'd like to change that back that's fine. - Hephaestos 13:17 23 Jun 2003 (UTC)

NASA logo

Hello, I've found a logo from NASA and I've uploaded it here: Image:Nasa-logo.png.

You seem to be the imaging expert here, so I'm hoping that you would process the image to a more manageable size.

Thanks. -- Erzengel 15:46 25 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Nice work. -- Erzengel 21:43 25 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hi Adrian. We have had a bit of a burst of articles about various duck species recently, which of course would be greatly enhanced by images. Those that occur in N America aren't too bad because of the US Fishery and Wildlife Service public domain images, but most European species (and Mandarin Duck) have nothing.

I remember you saying you had been to Slimbridge, and wondered if you had any images you could add to these articles. Alternatively, if you have images for which there are no articles, I could prioritise those species on my "to do" list. Thanks for any help you can give (incidentally, I'll be off-line for a few days after tomorrow morning, so if you reply and I don't respond, I'm not ignoring you.  jimfbleak 08:19 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * The following definitely exist

 * Bean Goose
 * Black Swan ? has some pics
 * Mute Swan ? has some pics
 * Snow Goose
 * Whistling Swan (may be under Tundra Swan)
 * Whistling duck (group article)
 * Red-breasted Goose
 * White-fronted Goose
 * Shelduck could go under Tadorninae for now

I'll check the others, and write (eventually) those I know something about.

Many thanks

jimfbleak 14:18 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hi Adrian, I replied to your question on my page. I think, it is easyer to keep a discussion on the same page (otherwise i get confused... ;-) Fantasy 14:01 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hi Adrian, thanks for your pictures in the Bremen article. Photos are doubling the value of a city article. As for the pronunciation guide, I am sorry for forgetting to leave a comment on my deletion. There are two reasons: Firstly, it is not correct; if the first syllable would rhyme with clay, the city would be spelled "Brejmen". Secondly, it seems to me, that pronunciation guides rather belong to a dictionary than to an encyclopedia. We don't have pronunciation guides for all the other cities and places (at least I didn't find them). So it is somewhat strange to have it here and nowhere else. If you strongly feel that a pronunciation guide for foreign language places is necessary, then we should ask the community on village pump what they do think about it. Admittedly, I'd be quite unhappy with it. -- Cordyph 14:28 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * OK, so Bray-mun is not quite right but surely close enough for a non-German speaker! And if we don't have pronunciation for the other difficult city names then we should, such a guide is perfectly well part of an encyclopedia (and a dictionary) However, lifes too short to worry about this, you and I just have different opinions of how much the reader should be told. We'll agree to disagree, and the reader can stay ignorant of how to pronounce the title of the article he/she is reading! I won't revert you.
 * Best Wishes Adrian Pingstone 17:14 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * I am sorry, that you feel that angry. That was not intended by me. I would feel more comfortable with a phonetic alphabet, since there are some sounds in foreign languages, which do not exist in English and which can't be represented in English syllables. And in my own defence, it is not, that German city names are usually pronounced in a very strange way. Like in Italian or Spanish or several other languages, pronunciation is almost identical with the phonetic alphabet. I am interested, what other Wikipedians think about a pronunciation guide, so maybe I will bring this topic onto the mailing list. -- Cordyph 21:21 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * Sorry, I am a mild person normally but I felt strongly on this and obviously it came over that way. Thanks for your polite response to my unfriendly reply. I'll carry the discussion on just a little further please .....
 * Wouldn't a phonetic alphabet, with its specialised symbols, be much more confusing than my simple attempt to approximate to the pronunciation and a key would be needed to the phonetic alphabet. How would the reader access the key? I think the issue is..... how to give a rough guide in the rare case where the assumption a reader would make on the pronunciation could be wrong. Are you aware that most English-speakers would assume it to be Bremen as in lemon? It would be good to sort the matter out so by all means discuss it further in another area of Wikipedia. Best Wishes,
 * Adrian Pingstone 08:15 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * I'm not sure if it's a genyooine Wikipedia standard or not, but I usually see such things done around here with the SAMPA alphabet, q.v. See SAMPA/English for the English rendition; SAMPA Chart kind of covers other languages. Usually it will have a link to the SAMPA page somewhere near the pronunciation's representation. I do favour having a simple pronunciation tip for the casual reader as well, though. -- John Owens 08:29 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * Hello, I just posted this to the mailing list. Maybe both of you want to join a discussion there? (http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2003-June/thread.html) I regret again, that I was so fast in deleting the pronunciation guide, but I strongly feel, that we should not give rough approximations for correct spelling. So SAMPA might be a solution that I would not oppose. -- Cordyph 08:33 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * Although it's easy to see the good intention behind the pronunciation guide, I too feel a transcription to English being a less than optimal solution, in particular as English as a mother tongue is pronounced quite differently in different parts of the world. Further I would warn against the clay-rhyme, as the last syllable in "clay" is a diphthong which both the English and US-Americans tend to insert falsly in their French (and sometimes in German) for stressed é-sounds. In my opinion both the "e" in "Bremen" is closer to the first "e" in "remedy", although the first "e" of "Bremen" is more than duplicated in length. Maybe some US-English pronounciations of "bear" would come close? -- Ruhrjung 12:46 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * OK, I now accept that Cordyph and Ruhrjung are right i.e. that non-English words can't be accurately rhymed with English sounds. Thanks for all your inputs. Which means, Cordyph, that you were right to revert me. Best Wishes, Adrian Pingstone 14:04 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Dump the drawings, they're just there on a better-than-nothing basis, and the taxobox is the standard place for the first picture/link to larger combination.

Thanks again for your help. I hope this is enough, because after tomorrow am I'm going to be off line for a few days. jimfbleak 18:47 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * Ok, that's fine, I'll sort out how to do it by looking at other taxoboxes that have a "Larger Version" message. Have a nice break (or whatever).
 * Adrian Pingstone 20:01 26 Jun 2003 (UTC)

 * Nice Bean Goose. We will make a birder of you yet. The two white-fronted geese might be an ID challenge. I realised what had happened with Black Swan, and just reverted it; I assumed you hadn't suddenly embarked on a campaign of vandalism!- -jimfbleak 12:59 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

No, I'm afraid you have jumped to conclusions. I am not a "troublemaker." Have a look at my 1900+ contributions if you need convincing. The fact is, no real explanation was given for the removal beside that jimfbleak didn't like my illustration. He jumped to the conclusion (much like you) that it was a "cartoon" or "parody." I find this insulting. There was no good reason to remove an illustration that is perfect for that article (it's a woodpecker finch, look at the images description!). I don't know what you have against people contributing original works, but it seems to be the consensus that my illustrations are not wanted in the bird pages. MB 14:37 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

As it happens, as an inveterate Recent Changes checker, I'd picked up on that and your excellent White-front and swan pics. Now, if you book your next holiday in the Galapagos Islands, I'll write the woodpecker finch article to go with your pics.

Hi Adrian. Your Snow Goose image should definitely be first choice, preferably labelled as blue phase. Whether it's worth keeping the other one for the tim being as well, to show the white phase, is more difficult given the difference in appearance - you decide what looks best, and I'll go with that. jimfbleak 05:28 28 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hi Adrian. I,ve been off line for a couple of days with the builders in. Don't the waterfowl articles look better with good pictures? As you say, the Bewick's can wait. There are large numbers that winter at Slimbridge, can't remember if they feed them there though (they do at Welney WWT). BTW, despite the similarity, Ross's Goose is a different species to the Snow Goose. Keep up the good work! jimfbleak 07:28 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Please see Talk:Finch. MB 21:29 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Nice Shelduck pic. Common Shelduck is the politically correct version of Shelduck to avoid Eurocentricity. However, since it's a European bird...

When I get time I'll write a shelduck article, so we can use the pic again - there are none written in Tadorninae yet. to busy today though (ordered to make a bookcase) jimfbleak

It's a not quite fully adult Orange-headed Thrush, Zoothera citrina, tropical species from India across to S China and down to Indonesia. Likes thick forest, so not easy to see in the wild. (copied from Village Pump).

Amazingly, I'd already done an article for this species, on the strength of having seen it in India. The full adult male is brighter orange, greyer-backed and the face streaks almost invisible. Adult female similar to your bird, but face less marked. A super bird, but likes thick undergrowth, so takes some finding. jimfbleak 11:05 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Hi Adrian,

It is great to see you turning your photographic skills to the birds now. It really make a huge difference to articles to have a picture, I think - especially for fauna ones (as opposed to, say, Constitution of Belgium).

I thought your 250px version of the Orange-headed Thrush seemed a bit blurry, and remembered the 750px original looking sharper than that. On checking, I saw that it was indeed nice and sharp, so out of curiosity I shrank it down to 250px myself using PMView (my usual image editor). Compare the old:

With the new:

(Hint: look at the wing feathers.) Interestingly, the new one is also smaller: both are 24-bit JPEGs but the old is 27.8k and the new 15.8k. Riddle me this if you can! I didn't do anything fancy, just used PMView to resize at the factory default settings. There is a new version of PMView out, called PMView Pro. Just for fun, I tried that one out too,and it does even better: 15.6k and a very slightly sharper picture (probably not enough difference to bother uploading and over-writing a third time, but I can pick them apart). Anyway, it occurs to me that maybe you could benefit from a top-class image viewer and manipulator, and though I have no commercial connection with PMView, I've been using it and recommending it for years, and in this particular case the difference is very visible. It's wonderfully easay to use so you might like to give it a whirl. You can download a 30-day free trial from their site. (End of free plug!)

Best -- Tony (Tannin)

Ahh, yes. I didn't think it was up to your usual superb standard, Adrian. Not a bad picture by any means (I've seen lots worse here), but with the consistent quality of your photographs here on the 'pedia, you have made a rod for your own back - we all expect perfection as routine!

But for this particular bird, don't worry too much. They are common as mud here. If, after all the money I've just spent on photography gear, I can't come up with a nice Australian Shelduck in the wild over the next little while, I'll put the camera, the scope, the tripod, and all the accessories into a big cardboard box and post the lot over to you, then start my new career as a coal miner or something. So long as the light is good - i.e., between about 10AM and about 3PM at this time of year - I only need to get within about 50 or even 100 metres of one. Doing birds without a long lens is seriously difficult!

On another matter, it's really odd to hear that Photoshop of all things is doing sub-optimal JPEG shrinks. It really shouldn't do that - as you know, it's supposed to be the big banana in graphics software. I imagine that there is some sort of setting that you have to change to make it optimise a bit better, but I have absolutely no idea what! It's too complicated for me. I'm strictly a hardware man these days.

Cheers -- Tony (Tannin)

Hi Adrian,

regarding APOD: All the images I "bookmarked" contain "Credit: NASA", and since NASA is a US government institution, I assumed the pictures to be in the public domain. Is this wrong? -- JeLuF 22:39 4 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I made you a taxoduck :) Tannin

Hi Adrian, I've written articles for Néné, both shelducks and Common Moorhen. I will do Andean Goose and Cape Teal when time permits. Are there any others where there is an uploaded pic but no individual species account?

Jim

Wow! I'm impressed! I think I might have to download a copy of Serif Photo Plus for myself. Is it difficult to use? (Yes, I'm a computer guy, but my expertise is hardware and (to a lesser extent) strictly business apps like spreadsheets - I look at Photoshop sometimes and just groan at the time I'd have to spend to learn how to use it. As for tinkering, not at all - a bettter picture is a better picture. More strength to your arm. Tannin

(PS: 50k is fine, IMO.)

 * I'm a dunce! My favourite PMView does the sharpening thing just fine, and I've owned it for years. Never thought to look before. And, do you know, I very nearly spent $US99 to buy Photo Plus last night. In other words, I've had all the software I need to do all the things you listed on my page just now all along. Time I started using it!

Best -- Tony


text:
Heaven or Las Vegas

Heaven or Las Vegas is the sixth studio album by Scottish alternative rock band Cocteau Twins. It was released on 17 September 1990 by 4AD. It is the band's second major-label release, following Blue Bell Knoll in 1988.

Heaven or Las Vegas peaked at number seven on the UK Albums Chart and number 99 on the US Billboard 200, becoming the band's most commercially successful release. It eventually sold 235,000 copies by 1996, according to Billboard. The album was included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, and was voted number 218 in the third edition of Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums. In 2020, Rolling Stone listed it at No. 245 in its list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

The album was voted 18th of Scotland’s 100 Best Rock and Pop Albums in 2003 and was the focus of a BBC Scotland programme, Classic Scottish Albums in 2007. Despite 4AD president Ivo Watts-Russell proclaiming it one of the best-ever releases on his label, he released the group from their contract at the end of 1990 because his relationship with the band had soured.

Background and development
Cocteau Twins released their fifth album, Blue Bell Knoll, in 1988. Despite signing a major label deal with Capitol Records, the band declined to promote it extensively but nevertheless shot a video for "Carolyn's Fingers" which was issued as a single only in the US. The album was not supported by a tour. The band brought on a manager for the first time as they had run into tax trouble previously. Watts-Russell, 4AD president at the time, reportedly "didn't care" for the new manager and his relationship with the band began to sour.

The band took on new familial responsibilities as bassist Simon Raymonde married his first wife, Karen, and vocalist Elizabeth Fraser was expecting her first child with guitarist and co-founder Robin Guthrie. The latter's cocaine habit previously "escalated" during the recording process for Blue Bell Knoll; Fraser and Raymonde believed that the new baby would prove a diversion from Guthrie's dependency and allow the pair to "play happy families." Their wishes did not pan out, with Guthrie relying heavily on drugs as the band developed Heaven or Las Vegas, causing him to experience "deep" paranoia and mood swings. His relationship with Fraser grew increasingly strained as a result.

In September 1989, Fraser and Guthrie's child, Lucy Belle was born; Heaven or Las Vegas was released on her first birthday. Of her pregnancy, Fraser said that she gained clarity about what mattered to her most: "Suddenly I had confidence which I'd never ever had in my life, which I consequently lost after I had the baby, because it's such a frightening experience you lose it again and you have to start over again. But it does change you." Raymonde's father, Ivor Raymonde, died shortly after Lucy Belle's birth, as the band were in the middle of recording. He recounted: "I was only 27, I was still quite young and he was a very influential guy for me so that was a big blow but, looking back on it, having a major life event happening probably helped the record have that edge to it."

Recording and composition
Heaven or Las Vegas displays musical evolution, with the music becoming more accessible. Fraser's lyrics were more intelligible; many concerned her newborn child Lucy Belle, particularly "Pitch the Baby", which is about her experience in giving birth and welcoming a child. Despite most of Fraser's lyrics "[emerging] in alien tongues", which she sums up as "laziness" and "bad diction", she attributed the album's more identifiable words to Lucy Belle's influence. "There was salvation in [Fraser's vocals and lyrics] too, in terms of helping save her relationship with [Guthrie], the joy of bringing a baby into the world that they could love. It did give them a new lease of life, and it gave the album an energy and vibrancy. It was very easy to make the music."Raymonde wrote "Frou-Frou Foxes in Midsummer Fires" the day after his father's death, and Heaven or Las Vegas straddled the two themes: "writing songs about birth, and also death, gave the record a darker side that I hear in songs like 'Cherry-Coloured Funk' and 'Fotzepolitic'". Despite being in a "very good space musically" and describing the recording process as an "inspirational time", Raymonde said: "It was trying to mask all the other shit that was going on that we didn't want to stop and think about for too long". In a retrospective of 4AD by music journalist Martin Aston, he noted that Fraser named the album Heaven or Las Vegas as "a suggestion of truth versus artifice, of music versus commerce, or perhaps a gamble, one last throw of the dice".

The album's drum programming was done by Guthrie, the first step in every Cocteau Twins recording session. Guthrie and Raymonde constructed the music before Fraser recorded her vocals. Raymonde likened Guthrie's rhythms on the album to hip hop beats–despite their music being far removed from it, he acknowledged that it came from a "dance-y" place. Much of Heaven or Las Vegas ' "mysterious" instrumental effects were achieved by accident, with guitars as opposed to "omnipresent" synthesizers. As a result of Guthrie's decreased time in the studio, Raymonde's playing was more prominent and he became more involved in the recording process. Raymonde recounted that he would record Fraser's vocals alone for days at a time, during which he first "fully appreciated how amazing she was": "She'd come into the control room and say, 'What was that like?' and I'd scrape the tears away and say, 'That was alright, Liz'. She didn't get off on praise. If I said. 'That was fucking amazing', she'd say 'I thought it was shit.' I learnt not to be too effusive, which was difficult because I was so blown away with what I was hearing."

"We've had it in the back of our mind that we wanted to play live again", said Guthrie at the time of the album's release, "so we thought we'd make some of the pieces more like songs we could actually play live [...] We like it better than all our last records. That's why we continue to make more–because if we made the perfect record we'd sit back and say, 'We can't do any better than that'. We think all our other ones are fucking crap. I'm slightly proud of a couple of tracks on a couple of them, but essentially I'm really embarrassed about what we've done in the past".

Artwork and release
The band wanted a visual representation that would capture "the ethereal", according to Guthrie. Paul West, of the design studio Form, previously worked with Cocteau Twins on the cover for Blue Bell Knoll. West recruited photographer Andy Rumball, and the pair experimented with various materials to generate a "textural and otherworldly" effect. The final artwork is a long exposure of Christmas tree lights against a colour backdrop, with its typography produced by hand on an acetate overlay. Much of the original artwork was later destroyed in a flood.

Heaven or Las Vegas was released on 17 September 1990 by 4AD in the United Kingdom, and in conjunction with Capitol Records in the United States. 4AD later reacquired American distribution rights for much of its back catalogue, resulting in a 2003 reissue solely on 4AD, which was remastered by Guthrie. A vinyl edition of the reissue was released in July 2014, which was repressed on 180g in 2020, remastered from high definition audio files.

The album was voted "Album of the Week" by German radio broadcaster Südwestrundfunk, and in France by radio broadcasters RMC and Radio Nantes.

Critical reception and legacy
The album has received critical acclaim. "Heaven or Las Vegas is their finest hour yet," enthused Martin Aston in Q. "Ten exquisite moments that make Kate Bush – their only possible comparison – sound as airborne as Motörhead". The album subsequently featured in the magazine's "best of the year" roundup: "It's wonderfully comforting how the Cocteaus continue on their inimitable course, blissfully regardless of what's going on in the world outside their surreal reality".

Andrew Perry of Select wrote that, Heaven or Las Vegas is the Cocteau Twins in their "usual, spectacular and enigmatic context". Vox's Roger Morton wrote, "In times when every other pop group is dragging on board whatever chemicals, '60s techniques and hypno-rhythms they can grab in order to achieve the desirable blissed-out condition. It's a good joke that the Cocteaus can get there with such apparent effortlessness".

Heaven or Las Vegas was listed as the 90th best album of the 1990s by Pitchfork, who complimented Fraser's more direct vocals and the album's complex songwriting. It was also included in the 2008 edition of 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, and in The Guardian's online edition of a similar list. It was considered the band's strongest work since Treasure by AllMusic reviewer Ned Raggett, who called it "simply fantastic" and successful in creating "more accessibility".

NME named Heaven or Las Vegas the 28th best album of 1990. Retrospectively, The Observer listed the album as the 97th-greatest British album ever made. In 2017, NPR listed Heaven or Las Vegas 138th of the 150 Greatest Albums Made By Women. In 2018, Pitchfork ranked it first on its list of the 30 best dream pop albums.

According to another article in Pitchfork, the song "Love... Thy Will Be Done" by Martika "almost certainly" contains a sample of "Fifty-Fifty Clown".

In 2020, Rolling Stone listed the album 245th on its list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

Track listing
Notes
 * On the 2014 remastered edition, "Fifty-Fifty Clown" is 3:17 in length and "Frou-Frou Foxes in Midsummer Fires" is 5:48 in length.

Personnel

 * Elizabeth Fraser – vocals
 * Robin Guthrie – guitar
 * Simon Raymonde – bass guitar
 * Andy Rumball – photography
 * Paul West – sleeve design

title: Heaven or Las Vegas


text:
1881 in art

Events from the year 1881 in art.

Events

 * April – Sixth Impressionist exhibition in Paris, at Nadar's studio.
 * August 31 – English painters Thomas Cooper Gotch and Caroline Burland Yates marry at Newlyn.
 * The Société des Artistes Français is established, with William-Adolphe Bouguereau as its first president.
 * Vincent van Gogh returns from study in Brussels to his parents' home in Etten (Netherlands) where he produces a number of early works, including the start of his series of peasant character studies and still lifes (including Still Life with Straw Hat).
 * Art Gallery of South Australia established in Adelaide.
 * St. Louis School and Museum of Fine Arts established at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, under the direction of Halsey Ives.
 * Dante Gabriel Rossetti's Ballads and Sonnets published.

Works

 * Lawrence Alma-Tadema
 * In the Tepidarium
 * Sappho and Alcaeus
 * Marie Bashkirtseff – The Studio
 * Jules Bastien-Lepage – Pauvre Fauvette
 * Alfred Boucher – La Piété Filiale (sculpture)
 * Frank Bramley – A Hopeless Dawn
 * Lady Butler – Scotland Forever!
 * Gustave Caillebotte - 'The Bezique Game (La partie de Bésigue)'
 * Paul Cézanne – Self-portrait with olive wallpaper
 * Pierre Puvis de Chavannes – The Poor Fisherman (Musée d'Orsay, Paris)
 * John Collier
 * Charles Darwin
 * Sir George Jessel
 * Edgar Degas
 * Little Dancer of Fourteen Years (sculpture)
 * Trotting Horse (California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco)
 * Stanhope Forbes – A Street in Brittany
 * Aleksander Gierymski – Jewess with Oranges
 * Atkinson Grimshaw – Shipping on the Clyde
 * Ralph Hedley – John Graham Lough in His Studio
 * Jean-Jacques Henner – Saint Jerome
 * Max Klinger – Paraphrases about the Finding of a Glove (etchings, printed)
 * Benjamin Williams Leader – February Fill Dyke
 * Frederic Leighton
 * Bianca
 * Whispers
 * Juan Luna – The Death of Cleopatra
 * Édouard Manet
 * Dead Eagle Owl
 * Le Suicidé
 * Luc-Olivier Merson – Nôtre-Dame de Paris
 * Hendrik Willem Mesdag – Panorama Mesdag
 * Claude Monet Waves Breaking
 * Albert Joseph Moore
 * Blossoms
 * Yellow Marguerites
 * Hjalmar Munsterhjelm – Woodland Pool by Moonlight
 * Giovanni Muzzioli – In the Temple of Bacchus
 * Jean-François Raffaëlli – Les déclassés (The Absinthe Drinkers)
 * Vinnie Ream – Admiral David G. Farragut (bronze, Washington, D.C.)
 * Pierre-Auguste Renoir
 * Bay of Naples, Evening
 * Blonde Bather (first version)
 * Luncheon of the Boating Party
 * Pink and Blue
 * Ilya Repin
 * Polina Strepetova as Lizaveta
 * Portrait of Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky
 * Dante Gabriel Rossetti – Found (work finished but never completed)
 * Augustus Saint-Gaudens – Admiral David Glasgow Farragut (bronze, Manhattan)
 * John Singer Sargent – Dr. Samuel Jean Pozzi at Home
 * Henryk Siemiradzki – The Sword Dance
 * William Stott of Oldham – Le Passeur ("The Ferry", Tate Britain)
 * Henry Jones Thaddeus – La retour du bracconier (The Wounded Poacher)
 * James Tissot – Goodbye, on the Mersey
 * Viktor Vasnetsov
 * Alenushka
 * Three Tsarevnas of the Underground Kingdom
 * James McNeill Whistler – Portrait of Lady Meux in two completed versions:
 * Arrangement in Black, No. 5
 * Harmony in Pink and Grey

Births

 * January 4 – Wilhelm Lehmbruck, German sculptor (suicide 1919)
 * January 5 – Pablo Gargallo, Aragonese painter and sculptor (died 1934)
 * February 4 – Fernand Léger, French painter (died 1955)
 * February 11
 * Carlo Carrà, Italian painter (died 1966)
 * Robert Borlase Smart, English painter and critic (died 1947)
 * April 10 – William John Leech, Irish painter (died 1968)
 * April 16 – Fortunino Matania, Italian-born illustrator and war artist (died 1963)
 * July 12 – Natalia Goncharova, Russian theatrical costume and set designer, painter and illustrator (died 1962)
 * July 28 – Léon Spilliaert, Belgian symbolist painter and graphic artist (died 1946)
 * July 29 – Jessie Traill, Australian printmaker (died 1967)
 * August 4 – Wenzel Hablik, Bohemian painter, graphic artist, designer (died 1934)
 * October 4 - René Gimpel, French artbdealer (died 1945)
 * October 25 – Pablo Picasso, Spanish painter, draughtsman and sculptor (died 1973)
 * December 8 – Albert Gleizes, French painter (died 1953)
 * December 31 – Max Pechstein, German painter (died 1955)
 * uncertain
 * William Conor, Irish painter (died 1968)
 * Nazmi Ziya Güran, Turkish painter (died 1937)

Deaths

 * January 3 – Anna McNeill Whistler, "Whistler's Mother" (born 1804)
 * January 24 – James Collinson, English Pre-Raphaelite painter (born 1825)
 * February 9 – Jacques-Édouard Gatteaux, French sculptor and medal engraver (born 1788)
 * March 11 – Thomas Brigstocke, Welsh portrait painter (born 1809)
 * May 24 – Samuel Palmer, English painter, etcher and lithographer (born 1805)
 * July 25 – Edward Charles Williams, English landscape painter (born 1807)
 * December 6 – Thomas Skinner, English etcher (poisoned; born 1819)
 * December 13 – John Quidor, American painter (born 1801)
 * December 14 – Berndt Godenhjelm, Finnish painter (born 1799)
 * December 21 - Francesco Hayez, Italian historical, portrait and political painter (born 1791)

title: 1881 in art