Shows
Women in FocusHelen talks to Prof. Annebella PollenPart one: Professor Pollen explores the visual history of naturism in Britain, revealing the paradox between idealised magazine bodies and real practitioners, and discusses why early naturists hid behind pseudonyms.
2026-01-0346 min
Women in FocusHelen talks to Prof. Annebella Pollen
In the first of a two-part conversation, Helen speaks with Professor Annebella Pollen from the University of Brighton, author of Nudism in a Cold Climate. Pollen discusses her decade-long research into the visual history of naturism in Britain, revealing how photography shaped the movement's public identity from the 1920s onwards. The conversation explores a fascinating paradox; whilst magazines like Health and Efficiency once sold hundred's of thousands of copies per issue, featuring idealised bodies of professional models, actual naturist membership numbers were much lower. Pollen explains how early practitioners hid behind pseudonyms to protect their professional reputations, and how the...
2026-01-0346 min
AntiSocialA potted history of the nudist movementThis month Bianca Censori, rapper Kanye West’s wife, broke the internet after appearing on a red carpet in a transparent dress. Meanwhile, artists were upset about their life drawing class being moved in North London. This prompted a conversation about public nudity and by extension, nudism. Professor Annebella Pollen is from the University of Brighton and author of Nudism in a Cold Climate, she explains the history and significance of the nudism movement in the UK.
2025-02-2406 min
Created NakedFashion & The Naturist“Body image is such a big thing in the 21st century. Most people feel there is something about themselves that is not so wonderful but people find when they get into naturism that no one is bothered about it. It’s the media and fashion industries that makes you feel you should hide yourself in a room if you don’t have the perfect body, which doesn’t exist anyway.” —Andrew Welch, quoted in https://disabilitynow.wordpress.com/2012/12/07/the-naked-truth/
"It is nonetheless something of an irony that those who vehemently reject clothes tend to think more deeply about dress than most, at lea...
2024-02-2101 min
The Photo Vault: A journey into Vernacular Photography, Archives and PhotobooksEveryday imaging - the analogue and the digital realmIn this episode, we delve into a talk event on Vernacular Photography that took place in November 2023. Our host, Lukas, was one of the speakers and has encapsulated a myriad of ideas, thoughts, and practices surrounding everyday imaging that were presented during the event. The talk was organized by the Eidolon Center in Budapest, a new institution that concentrates on vernacular, archives, and everyday imagery. They create a fantastic journal that showcases artists and academics actively working in the field. In this episode you will hear ideas by artists and academics such as Joanna Zylinska, Miklós Tamási...
2024-02-0126 min
The Photo Vault: A journey into Vernacular Photography, Archives and PhotobooksAnnebella Pollen - rejects are the majority and why we should study packagingThis episode of The Photo Vault prompts us to question the world around us by examining product packaging, which often reinforces and perpetuates stereotypical norms in various aspects of our lives.Our guest, Annebella Pollen, a professor of Visual and Material Culture, author of numerous books, and an avid collector, delves into some of her projects, interests, and findings. Discover why a seemingly innocuous bikini advertisement can contribute to reinforcing stereotypes and why Annebella champions the rejects.Links to some of her publications are provided below, along with references to further contextualize our e...
2024-01-0544 min
Stone Club Walks and TalksStone Club Walks and Talks with Annebella PollenThis time our guest is Annebella Pollen and our subject is The Kindrend of the Kibbo Kift.
Annebella Pollen is the author of The Kindred of the Kibbo Kift: Intellectual Barbarians as well as Professor of Visual and Material Culture at University of Brighton. Annebella's research areas include mass photography and the popular image, and histories of art, craft, design and dress, especially marginal, alternative and non-canonical forms.
The Kindred of the Kibbo Kift: Intellectual Barbarians is the first
full-length work to explore the innovative cultural production of the
English camping and hiking organization (1920-1932). Founded after the
First...
2023-12-1538 min
Rude Advice PodcastAnnebella and Charlotte | Personality, Humor and Rizz Go A Long WayEp 44 - Annebella and Charlotte host the Peasant Party Podcast in Austin, TX. We discuss dating in Austin and how much it’s changed over the past 3 years. How is more sexually aggressive, men or women? Also the power of charm, humor and charisma aka RIZZ. Why do women hate when you ask for their Snapchat? How to approach a woman and start a conversation and much more.
Social Media Links
Rudy A -https://linktr.ee/Rudy_A_Official
Peasant Party Podcast - https://linktr.ee/peasantpartypod
Annabelle - https://www.instagram.com/thefemalegothic/
Charlotte - https://www.instagram.com/ch...
2023-08-211h 43
Bureau of Lost CultureThe Kindred of the Kibbo Kift*If they were a cult, they were a very British cult.
*In the 1920s if you had seen strangely attired groups of people walking in formation along southern England's pagan pathways and round its prehistoric stone circles, you may have encountered The Kindred of the Kibbo Kift.
*They shared their initials - and a predeliction for arcane symbols, pointy hoods and cloaks - with the Ku Klux Klan but that's where the similarities end.
*They thought they were spiritual samurai, rebuilding Britain after the Great War with magical rituals, outdoor living and utopian vision. They were clean-living proto-new age w...
2023-05-141h 02
CensoredNudity: Health and Efficiency magazine (1933)For the first time on the podcast, it’s a publication that’s still banned in Ireland! According to Register of Prohibited Publications, Health and Efficiency is ‘unwholesome literature’. Naturally, we want to know precisely how this magazine is corrupting and degrading its readers. With Prof Annebella Pollen.Here’s today's 'blacklist'Annebella Pollen, Nudism in a Cold Climate: the Visual Culture of Naturists in Mid-20th Century Britain (2021) Annebella’s article in Health and Efficiency Throughout the thirties in Britain, when Nudism was becoming more acceptable and even fashionable...
2022-12-1535 min
New Nudist PodcastEp24: Nudism in a Cold Climate with Annebella Pollen and a Catch Up with EvanIn Episode 24, we hear Evan’s interview with Annebella Pollen, the author of Nudism in a Cold Climate. She’ll talk about The Visual Culture of Naturists in Mid-20th Century Britain. Plus Evan and I catch up about our summer nudie activities, and we talk about the Christopher Meloni Peloton ad.
SHOW LINKS
Nudism in a Cold Climate (publisher site): https://atelier-editions.com/products/nudism-in-a-cold-climate
Nudism in a Cold Climate (Strand Books): https://www.strandbooks.com/product/9781733622066?title=nudism_in_a_cold_climate_the_visual_culture_of_naturists_in_mid20th_century_britain
Annebella Pollen University of Brighton university prof...
2022-08-0254 min
Podcast From The PastTIM HAYWARD & ANNEBELLA POLLEN - The Number of the DuckJoining Tom Jackson to discuss the postcards from their pasts are food writer and broadcaster TIM HAYWARD (Loaf Story, Knife, The DIY Cook) and from University of Brighton, academic ANNEBELLA POLLEN (Mass Photography: Collective Histories of Everyday Life, Nudism in a Cold Climate). We explore the aesthetics of John Hinde postcards, semi-ritual pig killing and a remarkable coincidence at Monte Cassino; we stroll a Victorian Brighton walkway under threat, join the witches and weirdoes and hippies and others, as we chase life stories in photo albums. Plus a glimpse of collectors’ dreams and collectors’ nightmares, secret messages and the dirtiest postc...
2021-11-0459 min
Arts & IdeasSimplify your lifeLaurence Scott hears about a pioneer of vegetarianism and advocates for nudism and camping as the academics Elsa Richardson, Annebella Pollen, Ben Anderson and Tiffany Boyle discuss the Life Reform Movement. Ideas included arguments for a basic income, healthy eating, gymnastics, world peace and what a perfect body looked like. The movement emerged in the second half of the 19th century and was a loose collection of groups and individuals who pursued social reform of all kinds and their ideas were mainly Utopian, but had a darker side. Annebella Pollen teaches at Brighton University and is the...
2020-01-1553 min
Bande à partCocoons, Kibbo Kift & Tim WalkerWe wonder whether there is a trend for cocooning clothes to protect us from the anxieties of contemporary politics ... and discuss the V&A’s Tim Walker exhibition ... See links below.
Best in Show: Rebecca Arnold, Show Studio (2 June 2019): https://www.showstudio.com/projects/best_in_show/best-show-rebecca-arnold
Definition of froufrou: https://www.larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais/froufrou/35436
Carola Bauckholt, Hirn & Ei (2010/11), performed at Detmolder Sommertheater (Juni 2014): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-fHqfGpmdw
Tim Walker: Wonderful Things, V&A (until 8 March 2020): https://www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/tim-walker
Have fun! by Tim Walker, Vogue Italia (14 November 2016): https://www.vogue.it...
2019-10-2727 min
StilFrån camping till glamping – en bekväm (eller beklämmande) stil för vistelse i naturenNu när sommaren är här och semestern hägrar ska vi ta en titt på ett fenomen som kombinerar två till synes oförenliga komponenter glamour och camping, det vill säga glamping. Lyssna på alla avsnitt i Sveriges Radios app. Kanske kan man även kalla glamping för att campa med stil. För när det gäller glamping säger man hejdå till fuktiga tält, knöliga underlag och måltider tillagade av konserver och välkomnar istället varma boningar, bekväma sängar, elektricitet och inte sällan välkomponerade trerä...
2019-06-1455 min