We’re sharing a bonus #PeakofOurCollections adjacent image to promote an upcoming event at the Library Company:

PLOT: IN CELEBRATION OF THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE APOLLO 11 MISSION

Join us on July 16 to hear artist Rebecca Kamen talk about her recent art and video project in collaboration with artist Tim Chrepta. PLOT celebrates lunar exploration and the Parkes Observatory radio telescope to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission. She will discuss the research and development of PLOT and the significance of art as a vehicle for observing and capturing the moon prior to the advent of the camera. Kamen’s new interpretive artworks that transform historic lunar research into sculptural form will be discussed as well as exhibited. The PLOT project video created for an Australian Apollo 11 anniversary exhibition will also be shown.

Learn more and register here.

The featured image is from James Nasmyth’s The Moon: Considered as a Planet, a World, and a Satellite (London, 1874), and shows the “Back of a hand & shrivelled apple to illustrate the origin of certain mountain ranges by shrinkage of the globe.”

James Nasmyth, The Moon:  Considered as a Planet, a World, and a Satellite … (London: J. Murray, 1874). Second edition.

It’s time for a #Feathursday edition of #PublishersBindingThursday! Published in 1850, our copy of The Book of Birds features a stunning color-blocked white cloth binding.

Browse the Library Company’s database of 19th-Century Cloth Bindings to see more!

The Book of birds. Philadelphia : George S. Appleton. 1850.       

The gilt decoration on our copy of Robert Buist’s The Family Kitchen Gardener (New York, 1847) is giving us some major garden inspiration! 

#PublishersBindingThursday

Robert Buist. The family kitchen gardener, containing plain and accurate descriptions of all the different species and varieties of culinary vegetables. New York : J. C. Riker. 1847.    

Save the date! On July 16, 2019 the Visual Culture Program will welcome artist Rebecca Kamen to the Library Company to talk about her recent art project PLOT. Inspired by the celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Mission, PLOT seeks to evoke new insights about our relationship to the moon prior to the advent of the camera.

Head over to the Library Company blog to read about Kamen’s artistic process, and stay tuned to learn more about how you can join us for the event in July.

Plate “Fig. R” in Johannes Hevelius, Johannis Hevelii Selenographia Gedani, 1647.          

Athanasius Kircher’s The Vulcano’s: or, Burning and Fire-Vomiting Mountains (London, 1669) includes this fold-out frontispiece showing his theories on how fire and water interacted through an elaborate system of interconnected  subterranean channels and vents that resulted in volcanic activity (or, as the title suggests, fire-vomiting!). Notice the cross section of an erupting Mount Vesuvius in the third image. 

For the month of June we are participating in the #PeakOfOurCollections challenge, sponsored by the John Carter Brown Library, highlighting collection materials that feature mountains and volcanoes.

Athanasius Kircher. The vulcano’s: or, Burning and fire-vomiting mountains.  London : printed by J. Darby, for John Allen. 1669.

Yesterday we shared a plate with images of mountains and volcanoes from a recent acquisition. Today we’re sharing its front cover for #PublishersBindingThursday! 

The striped printed pattern bookcloth nearly obscures the blind-stamped decoration on our copy of Diagrams of Geology, History, and Physcial Geography (London, c1850).

Diagrams of geology, history, and physical geography. London: J. Reynolds, 1849-1850. 

We never tire of #MarbledMonday! Our copy of Amos Eateo’s Botanical Exercises (Albany, 1820) is bound in this beautiful marbled printed waste paper. 

Amos Eateo. Botanical exercises, including directions, rules and descriptions, calculated to aid pupils in the analysis of plants. Albany, Websters & Skinners. 1820.        

Opening today! 

From Negro Pasts to Afro-Futures: Black Creative Re-Imaginings

Stop by today, or join us tonight for the opening reception 530pm-7pm. Visit the following link for more info: https://librarycompany.org/portfolio-item/from-negro-pasts-to-afro-futures/

Our copy of James Bean’s The Christian Minister’s Affectionate Advice to a Married Couple (New York, 1866) is bound in a gorgeous pale pink fabric with a true moiré grain. #PublishersBindingThursday

Bean, James. The Christian minister’s affectionate advice to a married couple. New York : American Tract Society. 1866.     

Check out the Library Company blog to read our most recent Reader Spotlight: 

Michele Navakas studies the cultural significance of coral. At the Library Company, she found Stories Mother Nature Told Her Children (Boston, 1889), which includes the story “Sea-Life” – featuring talking coral. The polyps explain the anonymous, self-sacrificing labor of building reefs to a starfish: “We are here to build, and building is all we care to do.”  The author Jane Andrews discusses collective labor, but is strangely silent about oppression. #LCPFellowFriday

Andrews, Jane. The stories Mother Nature told her children. Boston.  Lee and Shepard. 1889. 

Illustration from James Dwight Dana’s Corals and Coral Islands (New York, 1872).