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My Work

I have worked in archives and museums, including Royal Museums Greenwich, the National Portrait Gallery, the BBC Archives, the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology at UCL and the Library of the London School of Economics (LSE) as well as carrying out original academic research since starting my PhD in 2000.

 

In 2024 I was awarded an Arts Council England Developing Your Creative Practice Grant to be experimental in exhibition curation and creative non-fiction writing. The subject of my application was a relatively little-known female nineteenth-century artist Ann Mary Severn (Newton). I explored voice and addressed issues around historic invisibility as well as having some fun with creativity, such as in this zine.

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I'm currently Creative Producer at the Portico Library, Manchester, where I have led a major National Heritage Lottery Fund project on public engagement with historic books and overseen the development of the audiences and public programme Activity Plan for a Capital Project. 

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Projects & Curation

 

  • Project Lead on People, Purpose and Place in Historic Books, funded by the National Heritage Lottery Fund, at the Portico Library 2023-25. See films about the project here. 

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  • ​Writer and Curator on ACE funded Developing Your Creative Practice Project Artist in the House in which devising creative non-fiction and a display on the life and work of the Artist Ann Mary Severn Newton (1832-66). 2024-2025

  • Writer, ‘Toolkit for Going Freelance with a Humanities PhD’. RESHAPED. School of Advanced Study, University of London. 2023-25

  • Public Engagement Consultant and Producer for the Beyond Notability. Re-evaluating Women’s Work in Archaeology, History and Heritage in Britain 1870-1950 (AHRC funded), School of Advanced Studies, University of London. 2023-2024.

  • Project Manager and Curator: From Aerodrome to Airport: The Impact of World War One, Croydon Clock Tower Exhibition Space, July to September 2018.

  • Co-Curator: What Does It Mean to be Human? Curating Heads at UCL, 2 October 2017 - 28 February 2018, Octagon Gallery, Wilkins Building, UCL.

  • Project Manager, Croydon Airport Calling. Flying to the Thirties, community venues in Sutton and Croydon October 2015 – January 2016.

  • Co-Curator, A Fusion of Worlds: Ancient Egypt, African Art and Identity in Modernist Britain, Petrie Museum, 12 March – 25 May 2014

  • Project Manager, The Lives of Stanley Halls: Theatricals, Community, Entertainment Community venues in South Norwood and Museum of Croydon, December 2013 – April 2014.

  • Curator, Fit Bodies: Greek sculpture, athletics and power, UCL Cloisters and Petrie Museum, 1 June - 23 December 2012

  • Curator, Typecast: Eugenics, Flinders Petrie and Francis Galton, Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, UCL. 16 March - 20 December 2011

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© 2025 by Debbie Challis. Proudly created with Wix.com.

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