by Sam Huck | Feb 14, 2025 | Exhibits, Library Work
Was the 19th century really as dull and drab as the era’s prints and photos might suggest? Far from it! While we might picture early America in black and white, that’s because photographs obscure garish fabric colors, busy wallpaper patterns, and rainbow-hued books. To help you see beyond the gray and sepia tones of the era, Outreach Assistant Sam Huck sat down with Jayne Ptolemy, our Associate Curator of Manuscripts and the main curator of the exhibit, More than Gray: Reimagining Early America in Full Color, for a Q&A.
by Isaac Burgdorf | Jan 20, 2025 | Exhibits
Contents Introduction Dress to Impress The World in Color Boring but Bright Beautiful Books! Additional Resources Additional Resources Full list of citations Coloring pages Interview with the Curator Beautiful Books! Online...
by Isaac Burgdorf | Jan 10, 2025 | Exhibits
Contents Introduction Dress to Impress The World in Color Boring but Bright Beautiful Books! Additional Resources Beautiful Books! If you cast your eye around the Avenir Foundation Room and the beautiful bookcases within it, you may notice the varied tones of rich...
by Isaac Burgdorf | Jan 10, 2025 | Exhibits
Contents Introduction Dress to Impress The World in Color Boring but Bright Beautiful Books! Additional Resources Boring but Bright Even things that are, quite frankly, boring at face value can have an unexpected, if still utilitarian, colorful side. A clutch of...
by Isaac Burgdorf | Jan 10, 2025 | Exhibits
Contents Introduction Dress to Impress The World in Color Boring but Bright Beautiful Books! Additional Resources The World in Color It wasn’t just the clothes early Americans wore that were colorful. In this case, you see evidence that people used monotone paper as a...
by Cheney Schopieray | Jan 10, 2025 | Exhibits
Was early America as drab as it appears in prints of stoic figures or black-and-white photographs? This exhibit illuminates the brighter side of history, spotlighting all the color and vibrancy that are often concealed by the gray and sepia tones of pre-1900 American imagery. Come see the garish fabric colors, busy wallpaper patterns, and rainbow hues of books that just might challenge you to think of the past beyond black-and-white.
by Isaac Burgdorf | Jan 8, 2025 | Exhibits
Contents Introduction Dress to Impress The World in Color Boring but Bright Beautiful Books! Additional Resources Dress to Impress You can’t deny that there’s something about a black-and-white photograph that feels… stuffy. With portraits showing people with their...
by Isaac Burgdorf | Sep 9, 2024 | Collections, Exhibits, Graphics
Political satire is not a gentle art—it is meant to leave a mark. Since the heyday of James Gillray and William Hogarth in 18th-century England, visual satirists have been able to “say” things about political leaders in their illustrations that would get writers censored (or worse). As such, it has played an important role in American political culture for over two centuries. Many of the qualities that we most readily associate with political leaders in our past come to us from satirical illustrations, not from things those leaders actually did. This exhibit invites you to think about how visual satire has shaped the way you think about political life in America. What can visual artists say about politics that writers can’t? What role does visual satire play in American political life in an age when most of what we read (and see) is online, rather than in a newspaper?
by Tiffani Ihrke | Apr 19, 2024 | Exhibits
Contents Exhibit Introduction Making Pictures Move Muybridge: Modern Media Manipulator The Business of Film: Production, Distribution, Exhibition Case Study: Life of an American Fireman Lost Film Lantern Slides Related Resources Lost Film Lantern Slides Before...
