Collins Unbound

“At-Home” Preservation with Gudrun Aurand
October 9, 2014
4:00 – 5:30 p.m.
Archives & Special Collections,
Collins Memorial Library

Hosted by Katie Henningsen, Archivist & Special Collections Librarian and Jean Fisher, Tacoma Public Library Northwest Room. Sponsored by the Tacoma Historical Society and Collins Memorial Library

In celebration of Archives Month, join us for this informational presentation to learn about how you can maintain your personal papers, photographs, and documents. Topics covered include the properties of paper, evaluation points, basic cleaning of documents, damaged documents, and storing documents.

There will be a variety of custom storage boxes on display as well as examples of repairs and the “tools” needed to make them, along with some samples of Japanese mending papers.

Gudrun Aurand is a practicing Bookbinder and Paper Conservator. Her experience comes from traveling a long and winding road along in the world of books. She received her MLS at the University of Cologne, Germany, and worked for 15 years as a Bookbinder and Conservator for Manuscripts, Archives and Special Collections in Pullman, WA. In 2009, she settled in Olympia, WA. Gudrun offers classes and workshops on Restoration, Repair and Preservation of books and paper based documents and prints.

Wednesday, September 17, 2014
7–8 p.m.
Collins Library Room 020

Nicole Pietrantoni is currently an Assistant Professor of Art at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington, where she teaches printmaking and book arts.  Her piece, Precipitous, is one of the works featured in the exhibit Book Power Redux at Collins Library.  It is collection of five hand bound accordion books that expand to create a life-sized panoramic image of a rising sea.

“As books, the works gesture to the authority of the encyclopedic and the cataloging of natural specimens. As an installation, they dismantle sublime images through cuts, folds and halftone dots. The overlaid poems by Devon Wootten are appropriations from a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change titled, “Climate Change and Water.” With a specific interest in printmaking’s historic relationship to representation, in this work I gesture to humans’ role in constructing and idealizing landscape. Referencing 19th-century panoramas as well as Romantic painting, the work nods to a particularly fraught period in our relationship to nature. Similarly, today’s changing landscape demands an examination of the tension between the enjoyment of beautiful, idealized landscapes and an awareness of their ecological complexity.”

This event was made possible through the support of the Catharine Gould Chism Fund, University of Puget Sound.

Coming Fall 2015 to Collins Library at the University of Puget Sound! An exhibit featuring artists, writers, and scientists reflecting on the importance of soils to our environment.

We are excited to begin work on a collaborative exhibit in support of the International Year of Soil as supported by the United Nations.

This exhibit will raise awareness of the importance of soil to our global community.  Preliminary plans include contributions from local soil scientists, educators and experts, a call for entries from book artists and writers to respond to the issues that scientists are raising about soils and our environment as well as insights into what makes up soil, with contributions from the Slater Museum and a collection of soil samples from across the community. We will also provide information on soils within the Tacoma community.

Interested?  Want to get involved? Please contact:
Lucia Harrison, Artist and Educator (Evergreen College)
Jane Carlin,  Collins Library Director

Improving the Diversity of Representation on Wikipedia

Help improve the coverage of underrepresented American authors and activists by editing their Wikipedia entries using the resources at the library!
No Wikipedia experience necessary!

Saturday, Sept. 20, 2014, 2-4 p.m.
Collins Memorial Library, rm. 118
Snacks provided!

Sign up and create your Wikipedia account during Archives & Special Collections Open Hours: Tuesdays/Wednesdays/Thursdays from 1-3 p.m. in Collins Library, room 211 or email archives@pugetsound.edu

All are welcome!

From left: Abby Hill and the children at Yellowstone National Park,
Mt. Booker Near Lake Chelan, Mt. Rainier from Eunice Lake

Join Laura Edgar, Curator of the Abby Williams Hill Collection, as she speaks to the Tacoma Historical Society

Monday, November 10, 2014
7:00 p.m.
Murray Boardroom, Wheelock Student Center
University of Puget Sound, Tacoma, Washington

The event is free and open to the public.
For more information: ledgar@pugetsound.edu

Abby Williams Hill (1861-1943) was a landscape painter, social activist, and prolific writer who lived in Tacoma from 1889 to 1910. She produced a remarkable collection of landscape paintings showcasing the grandeur of the American West, as well as a vast archive of letters and journals addressing issues of continuing social and historical interest including African-American and Native-American rights, early childhood education, alcohol abuse, the plight of tuberculosis patients, and the preservation of our national parks. Hill’s children donated her archive and over 150 of her paintings and drawings to the University of Puget Sound after Hill died in 1943. Laura Edgar, Curator of the Abby Williams Hill Collection at the University of Puget Sound, will speak about Hill’s life and her impact on the state of Washington.