http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/ en Copyright 2009 Thu, 23 Jul 2009 09:39:23 -0600 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Sound Design: The Rise and Demise of Album Art is a new exhibit that celebrates the glory days of the album cover, explores its dual identity as an art form and a marketing strategy, and mourns the loss of a consumer experience that has been gradually extinguished by the advent of downloadable music. Classic flower-power covers of the 60s and 70s--the original skull-and-roses cover on the Grateful Dead's eponymous 1972 release or the psychedelic, fish-eye portrait of Jimi Hendrix on his 1967 album, Are You Experienced—alternate with the dignified covers and distinctive crown-of-tulips logo of Deutsche Grammophon, the brainchild of advertising consultant Hans Domizlaff (1892–1971), now recognized internationally as one of the fathers of modern marketing. This fascinating exhibit, drawn from the vast collection of more than 25,000 LPs in the Northwestern Music Library, was curated by Music Library and Art Collection staffers Greg MacAyeal, Stephanie Hewson, Lindsay King, and Morris Levy. It runs through September 10, 2009. More information can be found here. Then, in the corridor to Deering Library, the exhibit Daniel Burnham at Northwestern marks the 100th anniversary of the publication of architect Daniel H. Burnham's Plan of Chicago by adding a very local touch to the current city-wide celebrations. This mastermind of big-city planning became a resident of suburban Evanston in 1887 and designed over twenty buildings in the area. Although Northwestern can claim just one Burnham building—Fisk Hall, built in 1898—Burnham's connection with Northwestern dates to 1895, when he received an honorary degree, and continued to 1905, when he submitted several potential "Plans of Northwestern" to the Board of Trustees. This exhibit, co-sponsored by the University Library and the Weinberg College of Arts & Sciences, and featuring materials from the University Archives, includes documents and photographs, blueprints from the construction of Fisk Hall, and sketches of Burnham's proposals for a redesigned Evanston campus—which make for an interesting comparison with the Plan of Chicago he produced a few years later. The exhibit, which will continue into the fall, was curated by Associate University Archivist Janet Olson. For more information, please click here. Finally, upstairs in Deering Library, we celebrate Northwestern University Library's extensive collection of international children's literature with the exhibit Best of Bologna: Edgiest Artists of the 2008 International Children's Book Fair. Produced in collaboration with the Bologna Book Fair and the Itabashi Art Museum in Tokyo, "Best of Bologna" features works by 23 talented children's illustrators from around the globe—Argentina, Belgium, Germany, Iran, Japan, and Russia, among other countries—a selection from an original pool of more than 3,000 artists who competed to be featured in Bologna at the world's largest and most important annual children's book event. The exhibit includes a movie about the Bologna Fair created by Ayami Moriizumi along with personal statements from each of the illustrators, offering intriguing glimpses into the ideas and experiences that inspire these artists. "Best of Bologna," curated by Special Libraries staff members Kim Specht and Jeff Garrett, will run through October 8, 2009. Click here for more information. All exhibits are free and open to the public during the Library's public hours (Monday–Friday, 8:30–5:00). "Burnham at Northwestern" is also viewable Saturdays 8:30-noon. ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/07/three_new_special_libraries_ex.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/07/three_new_special_libraries_ex.html Home Page Thu, 23 Jul 2009 09:39:23 -0600 "> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/07/roberto_sarmiento_wins_2009_pr.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/07/roberto_sarmiento_wins_2009_pr.html Home Page Wed, 15 Jul 2009 10:13:15 -0600 more)]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/04/report_on_the_state_of_special_libraries_at_northwestern.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/04/report_on_the_state_of_special_libraries_at_northwestern.html Home Page Fri, 03 Apr 2009 11:06:08 -0600 more information]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/02/repairing_the_bonawait_window_in_deering_library.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/02/repairing_the_bonawait_window_in_deering_library.html Home Page Mon, 09 Feb 2009 12:05:13 -0600 On the afternoon of Saturday, March 14, a group of MLIS students from the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign will be visiting special libraries at Northwestern. Among the highlights of the visit will be the Africana Library, Digital Collections, the Government and Geographic Information Department, Transportation Library, and University Archives. Roberto Sarmiento, head of the Transportation Library, will be hosting the group during their visit to Northwestern. http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/02/visit_by_u_of_illinois_mlis_st.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/02/visit_by_u_of_illinois_mlis_st.html Home Page Wed, 04 Feb 2009 15:04:30 -0600 ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/02/art_collection_adds_space_for.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2009/02/art_collection_adds_space_for.html Home Page Mon, 02 Feb 2009 12:46:57 -0600 Herskovits Library of African Studies at Northwestern University have begun a collection called “Africa’s Response to Barack Obama.” It is the first such collection spurred by the election of a United States president. “Obama’s election is an event of enormous significance in Africa,” explains David Easterbrook, head of the Herskovits Library, which houses the largest separate collection of Africana anywhere in the world. Even before Obama won the Democratic nomination, music CDs, performance DVDs, T-shirts, posters, books, bumper stickers, bookmarks, greeting cards and materials in other formats began proliferating across the African continent to honor his achievement. “These things document not just how Obama’s achievement is being celebrated in Africa but also how Africans are interpreting and applying it to their hopes for change in their own countries,” librarian Easterbrook says. Two exhibition cases at Northwestern’s University Library now display some of those materials. One is in the first floor exhibition area of the library at 1970 Campus Drive, Evanston. Another is in the entryway to the Herskovits Library on University Library’s fifth floor. A third case -- also in the Herskovits entryway -- will be complete by the end of the week. All are on view until Dec. 31. Among the collectibles are musical CDs (don’t miss musical group Kenge Kenge’s irresistible “Obama for Change”; a T-shirt bearing portraits of Kenya’s three Os (that’s Prime Minister Raila Odinga, football star Dennis Oliech and Obama); and tickets to “Obama: The Musical” (now at the Kenya National Theatre in Nairobi). Then, of course, there’s the enormously popular bumper sticker “Obama is Unbwogable!” Unbwogable? Think unshakeable. Unbeatable. Unstoppable. Sometimes a word just sounds like what it is! For further information about the “Africa’s Response to Obama” collection, call (847) 467-5918. For library hours, call (847) 491-7658. ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/11/northwesterns_obama_in_africa.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/11/northwesterns_obama_in_africa.html Home Page Wed, 19 Nov 2008 09:22:16 -0600 On October 14, University Librarian Sarah Pritchard announced a reorganization within Northwestern's Special Libraries Division, one that had already been suggested informally through discussions in the space planning process. University Archives and Special Collections will be merged into a single new department, to be called "Special Collections and Archives." The purpose of this reorganization, following the example of the University of Chicago, Duke, UIC, Washington University and other ARL members, is to pull together staff with expertise in the processing, organization, and promotion of primary materials into a single larger unit, facilitating the sharing of curatorial skills and the integration of research. This also creates a single department of a size comparable to the larger departments of the division, e.g. Music and Digital Collections, and of a size more like the special collections departments of our peer institutions. As the integration of Special Collections with Archives proceeds administratively, a national search for the head of this new combined department will be undertaken, based on a revised job description. This search will probably get underway in early 2009. The new department head will of course work closely with users and with the actual special collections, archives, or both; but will be heavily and primarily engaged in external affairs, donor relations, consortial projects, publications, grants, long-range planning and policy formulation. Within this new framework, Scott Krafft will be promoted to Curator, Charles Deering McCormick Library of Special Collections and Assistant Director of Special Collections and Archives. Kevin Leonard becomes University Archivist and Assistant Director of Special Collections and Archives. The two assistant directors will be more focused on user services, content development, digital project planning and execution, and the supervision of reading room operations. These new titles and redefined responsibilities will become effective as of November 1. Several other enhancements are planned for this new department. A new professional position as manuscripts librarian will be created, to work on processing and related services in both special collections and archives. The current special collections assistant position will become permanent--it has been a one-year renewable term position. There will be a new part-time exhibits and publications assistant, supported through endowed funds, which will report directly to the AUL for Special Libraries and will help all the departments in the division. Finally, a one-year renewable term LA2 position has been approved for University Archives. For the time being there will not be any physical relocations. Tentative space planning for eventual renovations to Deering Library has already shown us several options for collocating the services, staff and collections of these units. This reorganization is intended to help both Library and Archives work more effectively and mobilize a larger pool of expertise as we confront new challenges involving primary, analog, and digital resource management. This new larger department will also, it is hoped, give these collections a more visible presence at Northwestern as well as regionally and nationally. http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/10/special_collections_and_univer.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/10/special_collections_and_univer.html Home Page Thu, 16 Oct 2008 09:12:45 -0600 here. The newsletter, sent electronically to patrons, donors, and friends, highlights recent acquisitions, newly-opened holdings, and departmental news. Its purpose is to draw attention to the Archives' collections and services. One recently-developed product mentioned in the first issue of the newsletter is "On This Day in NU History," a daily blog entry featuring a pertinent event from the annals of Northwestern. On This Day can also be found on the Archives' Web site or acquired through RSS feed subscription. Please take a look and see what's new from the past. ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/10/university_archives_publishes_first_of_new_monthly_newsletters.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/10/university_archives_publishes_first_of_new_monthly_newsletters.html Home Page Mon, 06 Oct 2008 09:41:43 -0600 here to learn more. ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/08/speciallibrariesreportexciting.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/08/speciallibrariesreportexciting.html Home Page Thu, 28 Aug 2008 13:02:18 -0600 partnering with fourteen other academic libraries to develop this new service, to be formally launched in Spring 2009. This partnership comes at just the right time for Northwestern, where we are well on our way to establishing our own repository infrastructure on the Fedora platform. Partners in the Portico Archive Pilot Project include Brigham Young University, Middlebury College, University of British Columbia and McMaster University in Canada, and Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland. The mission of Portico is to preserve scholarly literature published in electronic form and to ensure that these materials remain accessible to future scholars, researchers, and students. Currently, 56 publishers have committed more than 7,700 journals to the Portico archive, of which 4,199 have already been preserved. 468 libraries have joined Portico, including Northwestern as a charter member. The new preservation service, which is one of Portico's first steps beyond e-journal preservation, involves developing protocols or "connectors" to facilitate the exchange of e-content between the Portico Archive and Northwestern's own institutional repository. The purpose is to protect locally-created repository content in the same way that Portico protects vulnerable e-journal content in the event of catastrophic loss, e.g through publisher bankruptcy. At Northwestern, Library IT and the Digital Collections Department of Special Libraries will be the lead units in working with Portico. Steve DiDomenico, senior IS architecture engineer in IT, has been named our chief contact to Portico, but he will be working closely with Stu Baker, Bill Parod, Claire Stewart, and others to make this collaboration a success. ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/07/northwestern_joins_portico_arc.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/07/northwestern_joins_portico_arc.html Home Page Wed, 16 Jul 2008 09:56:51 -0600 University Archives Presents: Happy 75th Anniversary, Deering Library! The exhibit, based on the new book, Deering Library: An Illustrated History, displays many of the photos used in the book. The wall cases feature huge blow-ups of four of the most beautiful color photos taken for the book by Peter Kiar; the black-and-white photos used throughout the exhibit, as well as artifacts, ephemera, correspondence, etc., come from the University Archives. Each of the cases tells part of the story of Deering Library: the previous libraries at NU, and the intrepid librarians who managed them; the design and construction of the building; its architectural detailing; its place in the hearts of NU students; the role of the Deering gardens; events and anniversaries; and the collections in Deering. Charles Deering McCormick Library of Special Collections presents: 1933: An Exhibit Celebrating the 75th Anniversary of the Deering Library To celebrate the 75th anniversary of our beautiful Deering Library, we have selected a diverse cross-sectional representation of materials from some of the discrete collections held within the McCormick Library of Special Collections, all of which are united by a common thread: they were published or otherwise created in 1933, the year the Deering Library opened. Exhibited items range from material from Chicago’s Century of Progress exposition, which opened in 1933, to books, prints and ephemera from our outstanding collection of 20th century European art movements including French and Czech Surrealist and Italian Futurist pieces. To view images, additional information, and other exhibits at the Northwestern University Library, please click here.]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/06/new_exhibit_happy_75th_anniver.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/06/new_exhibit_happy_75th_anniver.html Home Page Tue, 24 Jun 2008 11:10:03 -0600 http://youtube.com/watch?v=0YEcyBsOzfk. ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/06/africana_library_featured_in_b.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/06/africana_library_featured_in_b.html Home Page Tue, 17 Jun 2008 15:57:59 -0600 here. ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/05/university_archivist_patrick_q_1.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/05/university_archivist_patrick_q_1.html Home Page Fri, 30 May 2008 09:32:48 -0600 'Right Here I See My Own Books:' A Cultural History of the Woman's Library at the World's Columbia Exposition, Chicago, 1893 On the Court of Honor at the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago, a "Woman's Building" stood prominently for the first time at any world's fair to recognize women as contributors to culture. And, in a large second-floor room, the building also housed a library of 7,000 volumes written, edited, illustrated, or translated by women from all over the world representing women's contributions to the culture of print. On Friday, June 6, from 1 to 2:30 p.m., Northwestern University Library invites you to a program on both the history of the creation of the library and an analysis of its contents, many of which ended up on the shelves of this library. Speakers include: Wayne A. Wiegand, F. William Summers Professor of Library and Information Studies and Professor of American Studies at Florida State University, and co-editor of The Library Quarterly. Sarah Wadsworth, Assistant Professor of English, Marquette University, who was the guest editor of the special issue of Libraries & The Cultural Record devoted to "The Woman's Building Library of the World's Columbian Exposition, 1893." Melodie Fox, Associate Dean of Instruction at Bryant & Stratton College in Milwaukee, will present "The Woman's Building Library Relational Database: An Interactive Demonstration." The event takes place in the Library's second-floor Forum Room. __________________________________________ Hosted by the Special Libraries Division of Northwestern University Library. ]]> http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/05/upcoming_program_on_the_historic_worlds_fair_womans_library.html http://www.library.northwestern.edu/sl/news/2008/05/upcoming_program_on_the_historic_worlds_fair_womans_library.html Home Page Thu, 29 May 2008 14:06:56 -0600