Category Archives: Acquisitions

new acquisitions

Nicanor Parra, Don Quixote de Chile


Manifiesto is considered the fifth collection of poems by Chilean writer Nicanor Parra, originally published in 1963 by Editorial Nascimento as a single sheet folded in two parts inside a cardboard folder.

When an individual is presented not with one, but two of the highest awards in literature for his work, as was the case with Nicanor Parra then the poet must be doing something right in order to achieve such a place of distinction. In 2011 the jury that awarded the Juan Rulfo Award to Nicanor Parra bestowed the award in recognition for his body of outstanding work which included the books Poemas y anti poemas, Versos de salon, Canciones rusas, and Otros poemas, as well as Prédicas del Cristo de Elqui, Nuevos sermones, and Artefactos and Ecopoemas.

In December of 2012 Parra received the Cervantes Prize, the Spanish-speaking world’s highest literary honor that a writer can receive. On this occasion, the Royal Highness Prince of Asturias said the following words of praise for the antipoet, “We salute and recognize in the anti-poet Nicanor Parra the alter ego and all that has been built up over the years, Don Quixote de Chile, Nicanor Parra.”–Nicanor Parra: The Physicist Who Made a Significant Contribution to the Literary World by Ruben E. Gonzalez; Delilah Dotremon. Alabama State University, Montgomery. Hipertexto 19 Invierno 2014 pp. 63-82


MANIFESTO

Ladies and gentlemen
This is our last word
– Our first and last word –
The poets have come down from Olympus.

For the oldest
Poetry was a kind of luxury
For us, however
First need is:
We can’t live without poetry.

Unlike the older ones
– And I say this with all due respect –
We support
That the poet is not an alchemist
The poet is a man, too
A builder who builds his wall:
A door and window manufacturer.

We talk
In the language of everyday
We don’t believe in cabbalistic signs

And something else:
The poet is here
So the tree doesn’t grow crookedly.

This is our message.
We denounce the poet creator
The cheap poet
The rat in the library poet.
All these gentlemen
– And I say this with all due respect –
Should be accused and judged
For building castles in the air
For waste space and time
Composing sonnets for the moon
For grouping words together at random
According to the latest Paris fashion.
For us not:
Thought is not born in the mouth
It is born in the heart of the heart.

continue reading:
https://www.kalliergeia.com/en/manifesto-nicanor-parra/

Corona Ek Mahamari = Corona An Epidemic

 

 

 

Vijay Sadashiv Mashe, Corona Ek Mahamari [Corona an Epidemic], 2020. Cow dung background, poster color on traditionally treated cloth. 104 x 78 cm. Graphic Arts Collection 2021.

The Graphic Arts Collection recently acquired a dense composite painting by the contemporary Warli artist Vijay Sadashiv Mashe. The son of Sadashiv Mashe and grandson of Jivjy Soma Mashe, Vijay continues the traditions of the Warli painters, but with an international consciousness. The simplicity of the forms lends itself to the representation of our global pandemic and its consequences in India and beyond.


Read more about the Indian Warli Community projects at the V&A Museum of Childhood: https://www.vam.ac.uk/blog/museum-of-childhood/warli-at-moc

Migrant Labor Goes Home, 2020

Pushpa Kumari, Migrant Labor Goes Home, 2020. Natural color on cow dung, washed handmade paper. 67 x 54 cm. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021.

This recent acquisition painted by Pushpa Kumari is part of our ongoing effort to document the work of contemporary Indian indigenous artists during the 2020-2021 pandemic.

The following description was written by Anubhav Nath of Ojas Art:

“Shiv-Parvati play an important role in Madhubani art. They are depicted as Ardhnareswar, which portrays a perfectly fused balance of divine masculine and feminine energies.

In April 2020, caught unaware, thousands of migrant labor walked thousands of miles to their homes in the region of Bihar, from where this art form originates. This work refers to a lot of images from local media in connection to the migrant labor headed back and the duress they faced.

People walking with families in never ending queues with children being dragged on suitcases; a woman collapsing and eventually dying on the railway track as her infant child continued to breast-feed and laborers being washed down with disinfectant before being allowed to enter a village.

These images are symbolic of the lockdown, and have been translated into a traditional Madhubani style very effectively and poignantly.”

China Painting

Porcelain paints case, 1880s. German. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021- in process

The Graphic Arts Collection recently acquired a linen case containing 98 glass vials filled with powder pigments to be used in the painting of porcelain wares, also known as china painting. The pigment is now permanently sealed in the vials with the cork tightly fixed to the glass. Each vial is numbered with a paper label. “China or porcelain paint pigment does not dissolve in water or oil, because the pigments are made up of metallic oxides blended with fine powdered glass. The powdered glass acted as a flux so that the glaze and coloured paint would adhere together permanently upon firing.”

As Debby DuBay writes in The Journal of Antiques and Collectibles:

…Women played significant roles in the birth of the china-painting movement in America. In 1873 in Cincinnati, Karl Lagenbeck, an immigrant ceramic chemist, and his neighbor, Maria Longworth Nicols (1849-1932) experimented with over-glaze china paints. Maria, a student at the McMicken School of Design, placed some of her decorated pieces on display at a student exhibition. Several classmates, specifically one Mary Louise McLaughlin (1847-1939), was so smitten by the beauty of Nicols’ work that she requested their instructor, Ben Pitman, to purchase the necessary supplies to paint on porcelain.

With so much interest in this new art form, Pitman engaged Marie Eggers, an immigrant who had studied the art of china painting in the Dresden factory, to teach a class in 1874. This group of students entered their wares in the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition and were responsible for exposing millions of Americans to this new art form.

…By 1877 there had been several books published in Europe on directions for painting on china for amateurs, but it is student Mary Louise McLaughlin who published the first book in America – China Painting, A Practical Manual for the Use of Amateurs in the Decoration of Hard Porcelain. McLaughlin’s infectious enthusiasm for this art form spread throughout the United States, and she is credited with educating the general public and those who could not attend classes on the art of china painting. Her book included information on tracing on china, china painting techniques and directions for gilding, firing, etc.

In 1879 McLaughlin formed the Woman’s Pottery Club. By 1881, there were major china painting studios in Boston, Cincinnati, Philadelphia and New York, including The Osgood Art School established in New York City by Adelaide Harriett Osgood (1842-1910). But it is McLaughlin who is credited with influencing the entire nation and setting the standards for porcelain clubs established throughout the United States.–Painted Porcelain: Women Played a Major Role – The Journal of Antiques and Collectibles –by Debby DuBay.https://journalofantiques.com/features/hand-painted-porcelain-women-played-a-major-role/

Anita J. Ellis, The ceramic career of M. Louise McLaughlin (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press [for] Cincinnati Art Museum, 2003). NK4023.M382 E443 2003

Mary Louise McLaughlin, China painting: a practical manual for the use of amateurs in the decoration of hard porcelain (Cincinnati: R. Clarke, 1877). ReCAP 738 M22

 

The person with the most nose knows most

Nikolaĭ Vasilʹevich Gogolʹ (1809-1852), The Nose by Nikolai Gogol; English translation and commentary by Stanislav Shvabrin; sixteen drawings with collage by William Kentridge (San Francisco: Arion Press, 2021). Copy 17 of 40. Deluxe edition. Graphic Arts Collection 2021- in process

 

“The edition is limited to 250 copies for sale with 26 lettered hors commerce copies reserved … Of these, 190 Limited edition copies are bound with cloth spines and paper sides, and 20 Variant plus 40 Deluxe edition copies are bound with leather spines and cork paper sides. All copies are signed by the artist and presented in clamshell boxes accompanied by a flipbook, “His Majesty Comrade Nose”, produced in an edition of 350 copies.

The Deluxe edition includes a photogravure “Surveying His Escape” with red pencil markings by the artist. 40 prints plus 5 Printer’s Proofs, 3 Artist’s Proofs, and 2 B.A.T. Proofs have been editioned by Lothar Osterburg in Red Hook, New York on 300 gsm Somerset with gampi chine collé and kozo insets.”–Colophon.


 

From the prospectus: Originally published in 1836 in Alexander Pushkin’s magazine Sovremennik (The Contemporary), The Nose tells the story of Major Kovalyov, a St. Petersburg official whose nose develops a life of its own. The absurdity of the tale, in which Kovalyov awakens to find his nose gone, then later comes to find it has surpassed him in social rank, lays bare the anxiety that plagued Russia after Peter the Great introduced The Table of Ranks: a document reorganizing feudal Russian nobility, by placing emphasis on the military, civil service and the imperial court in determining an aristocrat’s social standing.

 

 

For this edition, Arion Press chose to collaborate with artist William Kentridge, who directed and designed a visually dazzling 2010 Metropolitan Opera production of Dmitri Shostakovich’s adaptation of The Nose. This is his second project with the press, following The Lulu Plays, published in tandem with his 2015 production of the Alban Berg opera, Lulu, also for the Met. Kentridge’s method combines drawing, writing, film, performance, music, theater and collaborative practices to create works of art that are grounded in politics, science, literature, and history.

 

 

This edition includes a photogravure “Surveying His Escape” printed in warm black ink on 300 gsm Somerset with gampi chine collé and kozo insets, editioned by Lothar Osterburg in Red Hook, New York. See also: https://graphicarts.princeton.edu/2018/03/30/library-dreams-after-magrittes-time-transfixed/

An early 20th-century American co-ed

Merab Carroll Gamble Brook (1896 or 1898 – 1995), Photography album, ca.1921. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2021- in process

Marab Gamble went to school at Lebanon Valley College, Annville, Pennsylvania, eight miles from Hershey. Established in 1866, the college was the first in that area to include both men and women as undergraduates. Their website notes “While not the first in Pennsylvania to be co-educational, it was first among its degree conferring competitors in Eastern Pennsylvania. Swathmore though it received its Charter in 1864 did not open until 1869. The University of Pennsylvania did not become co-educational until 1877″.

Gamble kept a photography album with 366 carefully cut and captioned prints focused on her student days from 1916 to 1918. Directly after graduation, she moved back with her family in Buffalo, where she took a job as a high school teacher. This is the address at the front of her album. Fifteen years later she married Mr. Brook and can be found in some records listed as Marab Brook. Eventually they settled in Goshen, NY, where they both continued teaching.

The album holds many informal snapshots from Lebanon Valley College that show Gamble working and relaxing with her friends. Many have lively captions, such as “We don’t believe in trouble!” and “Off for a good time!” The album documents several trips, with and without her school class, as well as sporting events, contests, and concerts. In all, it shows the active life of an early 20th century American co-ed.

Opere del signor Piranesi, che sono state pubblicate fino all’anno 1762

Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778), Opere del signor Piranesi: che sono state pubblicate fino all’anno 1762. E che si vendono presso il medesimo nel palazzo del sig. conte Tomati, a strada Felice vicino alla Trinità de’ Monti, a’ seguenti prezzi (Roma: Piranesi, 1762). 1 letterpress sheet, Italian and French. 31 x 21 cm. Graphic Arts Collection.

The Graphic Arts Collection is fortunate to have acquired an early printed catalogue of works published “until the year 1762” by Giovanni Battista Piranesi. Making it even more of a treasure is a handwritten addition (presumably Piranesi’s own hand) in the right column list of the “Views of Rome” up to n. 60 “Del Pantheon, paoli tre.” The following view “Del Tempio della Sibilla in Tivoli” [“Of Sibyl’s Temple in Tivoli”] has been added in manuscript.

recto
verso

This catalogue is not unlike the later sheet in the collection of the Getty Research Institute. Each catalogue, at Princeton and the Getty, has text in Italian and French to expand Piranesi’s audience and hopefully his sales.Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778), Opere del cavalier Piranesi: che si vendono sciolte il medismo nel palazzo del. Sig. Conte Tomati a strada Felice … [Rome : G. Piranesi, 1778?]. 1 letterpress sheet, Italian and French; 33 x 22 cm. Getty Research Institute

 

Whether or not Piranesi studied printmaking in Venice, it is certain that soon after his arrival in Rome in 1740, he apprenticed himself briefly to Giuseppe Vasi, the foremost producer of the etched views of Rome that supplied pilgrims, scholars, artists, and tourists with a lasting souvenir of their visit. Quickly mastering the medium of etching, Piranesi found in it an outlet for all his interests, from designing fantastic complexes of buildings that could exist only in dreams, to reconstructing in painstaking detail the aqueduct system of the ancient Romans. The knowledge of ancient building methods demonstrated by Piranesi’s archaeological prints allowed him to make a name for himself as an antiquarian—his Antichità Romane of 1756 won him election to the Society of Antiquarians of London. . . . Given his admiration for Rome and his contentious nature, Piranesi could hardly refrain from entering into the debate at mid-century over the relative merits of Greek and Roman art. Here, too, etching served him well as a means of supporting his arguments. His Delle magnificenza ed architettura de’ Romani of 1761 advanced the view, shared by other scholars, that the Romans had learned not from the Greeks—as British and French scholars had begun to argue—but from the earlier inhabitants of Italy, the Etruscans. Piranesi used his knowledge of ancient engineering accomplishments to defend the creative genius of the Romans, but devoted even more space to a celebration of the richness and variety of Roman ornament. — Thompson, Wendy. “Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778)”. In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/pira/hd_pira.htm (October 2003)

We have not been able to identify the enormous watermark that is nearly the size of the entire sheet. Andrew Robinson notes “Although I have now catalogued over 60 watermarks on different Piranesi papers, I am only tentatively confident about my fixing of their dates.” Hopefully a better image of this new mark can be made, which will lead to further scholarship.

Our sheet will be included this fall in the Firestone Library exhibition, Piranesi on the Page. https://library.princeton.edu/news/general/2020-02-13/puls-upcoming-exhibition-piranesi-page-reveals-art-architects-books. The exhibition is curated by Heather Hyde Minor, professor, University of Notre Dame, and Carolyn Yerkes, associate professor, Princeton University. Piranesi Unbound, a book associated with the exhibition written by the curators, is available from the Princeton University Press.

Voyages d’un naturaliste et ses observations


In 1799, Michel Etienne Descourtilz, a French naturalist and surgeon, arrived at Saint Domingue on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola and remained there nearly four years, during which time the indigenous people revolted. Today the island hosts the Dominican Republic and Haiti. Although Descourtilz collected samples, documented language and music, and made sketches, many of his belongings were destroyed during the revolution. Returning to Paris, it took him five more years to complete his narrative, first published in 1809.

“The first-person accounts by whites taken prisoner during the interracial violence in Saint-Domingue during the revolutionary era … were written primarily to refute opponents of slavery in revolutionary France. Precisely because their authors had personally confronted a situation in which black slaves had at least provisionally defeated the white world-the only such situation in the Atlantic world up to that time-these narratives are of extraordinary interest for the development of modern discourses about race and identity.

The Saint-Domingue insurrection, which began in 1791 and culminated in the creation of the independent black republic of Haiti in 1804, has haunted thinking about race throughout the Western world ever since. …The insurrection demonstrated that people of color could not only be active agents in the making of history, but that they could overthrow white rule and seize control of the crown jewel of one of the great European empires, the most valuable piece of colonial real estate in the world at the time. Toussaint Louverture, the black leader who emerged to lead this movement, represented slaveholders’ worst nightmare, and his saga became an inspiration for movements for freedom among people of color on both sides of the Atlantic.

Compared to the number of narratives about North American whites captured by Native Americans or white Europeans enslaved in the “Barbary states” of North Africa, the corpus of first-person testimonies from the Saint-Domingue uprising is small. Only two fairly lengthy accounts published at the time are known: the colonist Gros’s Historick Recital, of the Different Occurrences in the Camps of Grand-Reviere…, and the naturalist Michel Etienne Descourtilz’s Voyages d’un naturaliste, which recounts the author’s experiences from 1799 to 1803, during Toussaint’s reign and in the war which resulted in the destruction of the last vestiges of white rule in Haiti.” —Jeremy D. Popkin, “Facing Racial Revolution: Captivity Narratives and Identity in the Saint-Domingue Insurrection,” Eighteenth-Century Studies , Summer, 2003, Vol. 36, No. 4 (Summer, 2003) URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/30053605

 

Michel Etienne Descourtilz (1775-1835), Voyages d’un naturaliste, et ses observations : faites sur les trois règnes de la nature, dans plusieurs ports de mer français, en Espagne, au continent de l’Amérique Septentrionale, à Saint-Yago de Cuba, et à St.-Domingue, où l’auteur devenu le prisonnier de 40,000 Noirs révoltés, et par suite mis en liberté par une colonne de l’armée française, donne des détails circonstanciés sur l’expédition du général Leclerc [Travels of a naturalist, and his observations: made on the three kingdoms of nature, in several French seaports, in Spain, in the continent of North America, in Saint-Yago de Cuba, and in Santo Domingo, where the author who became the prisoner of 40,000 revolting indigenous people, and consequently released by a column of the French army, gives detailed details of the expedition of General Leclerc] (Paris: Dufart père, 1809). Complete with 45 full-page colored stipple engravings (3 frontispieces); a conversation in Creole; and two local songs with musical scores. Graphic Arts Collection GAX2021- in process

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

Les Ascensionnistes

 

 

Les Ascensionnistes. Nouveau jeu de Société très Attrayant, [The Mountaineers: An Attractive New Board Game]. (Paris: MD [Mauclair & Dacier]; Printed at Roches Frères, ca. 1885). Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021- in process

The game’s decorated box holds a folding chromolithographic board with 108 numbered squares; six hand painted die-cast figures; 32 white and coloured playing tokens in a bag; a shaped paper-mâché tray; a bone dice; and printed instructions. According to the online Game of the Goose database (http://www.giochidelloca.it/anteprime.php?pagina=40&ordine=anno) this is the same game published by Simonin-Cuny and similar game reset with different title (Jeu des Alpinistes. Nouveau Jeu très Amusant) also published by Simonin-Cuny.

The firm of Mauclair-Dacier, located on 5 rue Haudriette in Paris (with a factory on 148 avenue Daumesnil), specialized in manufacturing and selling toys and games. It was active from the 1880s until it was acquired by the firm of Les Jeux Réunis in 1904. Visit the Mauclair-Dacier game factory: http://www.jeuxanciensdecollection.com/article-visite-de-l-usine-modele-mauclair-dacier-121197715.html

 

 

 

Illustrations from Henriette de Beaumont d’Angeville (1794-1871), My ascent of Mont Blanc; with a preface by Dervla Murphy ; translated from the French by Jennifer Barnes (London: HarperCollins, 1991). ReCAP, GV199.92.A54 A3 1991.

The Mountaineers game, exclusively designed around male climbers, reminds us of Henriette d’Angeville (1794–1871), “reported to have been the first woman to climb Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in the French Alps. True, Marie Paradis, a local peasant, driven by the lure of financial gain and encouraged by fellow adventurers, had gone to the top in 1808. But unlike her, d’Angeville made the decision to attempt the feat without the encouragement of others, preparing and paying for the trip herself. Her success earned her recognition as the first climber of the “weaker sex” to reach the summit of Mont Blanc. Surprisingly, the feat received little commentary, except in books on the history of mountaineering where a few scattered passages mentioned her – sometimes in disparaging terms.”–Women in Trousers: Henriette d’Angeville, a French Pioneer? By Pascale Gorguet Ballesteros. 04 Nov 2016 https://doi.org/10.1080/17569370.2016.1215112

Less distinguished but equally ambitious was Helen Henderson Chain, wife of James A. Chain. Both were artists and avid climbers as seen in the photographs of their 1888 trip to Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. https://wp.me/p3KgmJ-4Wu

Helen Henderson Chain and James A. Chain, The Chain Gang Abroad: Around Europe with a Camera [photography album], 1888. Some photography by Helen Henderson Chain ( 1848-1892). Graphic Arts Collection (GAX) Oversize 2008-0001E

 

Women’s Army Corps (WAC) Album

With war looming, U.S. Rep. Edith Nourse Rogers of Massachusetts introduced a bill for the creation of the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps in May 1941. Having been a witness to the status of women in World War I, Rogers vowed that if American women served in support of the Army, they would do so with all the rights and benefits afforded to Soldiers. Spurred on by the attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, Congress approved the creation of WAAC on May 14, 1942. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the bill into law on May 15, and on May 16, Oveta Culp Hobby was sworn in as the first director. –from “Creation of the Women’s Army Corps, Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC)” https://www.army.mil/women/history/wac.html

Hobby immediately began organizing the WAAC recruiting drive and training centers. Fort Des Moines, Iowa, was selected as the site of the first WAAC Training Center. Over 35,000 women from all over the country applied for less than 1,000 anticipated positions. The first women arrived at the first WAAC Training Center at Fort Des Moines on July 20, 1942. Among them were 125 enlisted women and 440 officer candidates (40 of whom were black), who had been selected to attend the WAAC Officer Candidate School, or OCS.

In January 1943, U.S. Rep. Edith Nourse Rogers of Massachusetts introduced identical bills in both houses of Congress to permit the enlistment and commissioning of women in the Army of the United States, or Reserve forces, as opposed to regular enlistments in the U.S. Army. This would drop the “auxiliary” status of the WAAC and allow women to serve overseas and “free a man to fight.” President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the legislation on July 1, 1943, which changed the name of the Corps to the Women’s Army Corps (WAC) and made it part of the Army of the United States. This gave women all of the rank, privileges, and benefits of their male counterparts.


Janet Angwin’s Women’s Army Corps Album with 330 photographs and over 130 other items, 1944-46. Graphic Arts Collection. GAX 2021- in process

The Graphic Arts Collection holds a scrapbook documenting Janet Angwin’s service in the Women’s Army Corps or WAC, beginning with the order calling her up to active duty November 11, 1944, and her trip to Fort Des Moines. The album provides a personal account of the her experience in the WAC, along with detailed information on women serving in the United States Army. Included are WAC recruitment and informational pamphlets, city guides for enlisted men and women, official army memos (some mentioning Angwin by name), and the news briefs and humorous publications of the various forts where she was stationed.

Angwin was working at the Alameda Naval Air Station when she was called to active duty. At the Fort Des Moines training center she became certified to drive cargo trucks and vehicles, and was stationed in South Carolina, the Seattle Port of Embarkation, and finally Fort Lawton in Washington.

Some of the publications collected in the album are: Facts you want to know about the WAC; WAC Handbook; the “Re Port” for the Special Service Branch Charleston Port of Embarkation; Daily News Summary editions for the Charleston; and Glamour magazine pamphlet “Mustering-out Wardrobe for Servicewomen” showing what they could buy with their wardrobe allowance of $200.