The Past in Colour - Gallery

Thumbnail image of Charles Darwin, British naturalist, 1878. Artist: Unknown

Our digitisation and restoration team continue to create exceptional colourised works. Have you ever wondered what Darwin, Queen Victoria or Einstein might look like if photographed in colour? Well our team have created just that! With scrupulous research and great artistry these works aim to bring the past alive and that little bit closer.

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Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), Austrian neurologist
 
Newspaper boy with news of the Titanic disaster, 14 April 1912
 
Virginia Woolf, English novelist, essayist and critic, early 20th century
 
Queen Elizabeth II returning to Buckingham Palace after her Coronation, 1953
 
Oscar WiIde, Irish writer, wit and playwright, c1890
 
Charles Darwin, British naturalist, 1878
 
Winston Churchill making his famous V for Victory sign, 1942
 
Christine Keeler arriving at the Old Bailey, London, 1963
 
Thomas Hardy, English poet, novelist and dramatist with his second wife, Florence, 1912-1928
 
Herbert George Wells, British novelist, 1914.Artist: Emil Otto Hoppe
 
The Duke and Duchess of Windsor (Mrs Simpson) at the Chateau de Cande, France, 1937
 
Princess Elizabeth aged nine, 1935, (1937). Artist: Marcus Adams
 
Florence Nightingale, English nurse and hospital reformer, 1854
 
Hans Christian Andersen, Danish author and poet, mid 19th century
 
William Ewart Gladstone MP, British Liberal Prime Minister, 1882.Artist: Lock & Whitfield
 
Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, c1890
 
Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French artist, 1917
 
Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield, British Conservative Prime Minister, 1881.Artist: Lock & Whitfield
 
Isambard Kingdom Brunel, British engineer, 1857 (1956)
 
Jules Verne, French novelist, 1877.Artist: Lock & Whitfield
 
Walt Whitman, American poet, c1880s.Artist: Mathew Brady
 
Charles Darwin, British naturalist, 1878
 
Guglielmo Marconi, Italian physicist and inventor, 1926
 
Albert Einstein, German-Swiss mathematician and theoretical physicist, c1930s
 
Alexander Graham Bell, Scottish-born American inventor, 19th century
 
Alice Keppel, English socialite, 1906 (1964)
 
Arthur Conan Doyle, Scottish writer, c1900
 
Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895), English biologist, 1890. Artist: W&D Downey
 
Henry Morton Stanley, African explorer, 1880.Artist: Lock & Whitfield