Update - What's New at the Library



Garden Bulbs In Color SB425 .M25 1938

 Spring has sprung at the Chrysler! Lovely tulips have blossomed in both the Memorial Garden and Mary’s Garden. The galleries are also blooming with color – whether it’s the amazing watercolors of James Tissot: The Life of Christ or the brilliant flowers of Tiffany Lamps:Articles of Utility, Objects of Art. In the Library, too, all sorts of new things are springing up. It’s been awhile since we’ve had a Library update, so here are a few of the many things that are new:

New look –
You may have noticed - the blog looks a little different. After a brief hiatus we’re back with an updated look and some new features. You may enjoy checking out a changing selection of recently researched items, or linking our posts to your Facebook or Twitter page. You can also sign up to receive an email whenever the blog is updated.    We hope you like the changes – please tell us what you think.


New faces –
On April 6 we welcomed Special Project Librarian Chelsea DeAngio to the Library Staff. Chelsea is already hard at work making new materials available to Library patrons and helping with reference requests. She’s great! If you haven’t already, stop by and say hello.

The Museum also welcomed a new curator, Amy Brandt, in March. Amy is the new McKinnon Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, and has been hard a work researching the collection. She’s already helped us build the Library’s collection of books about contemporary art with some much needed additions. You can read more about Amy here. We’re glad to be working with her.

New information -
Everywhere you look in the galleries, there something new and different to look at - new exhibitions, new collections, and new works of art. We’ve been keeping pace in the Library. You’ll find information about all of the current exhibitions on hand in the reading room, along with a number of newly acquired books.

Old and interesting –
If you’ve already visited the James Tissot: The Life of Christ exhibition you may be interested in taking a look at our 1903 New York edition of the completed illustrated Bible for which the watercolors were produced. The three volume set is on view in the reading room.

We’re also featuring new items from the Library’s “hidden” collections in the reading room display case. Along with The Civil War: Visual Perspectives, Then and Now exhibition on view in the Waitzer Community Gallery – a challenging look at the meaning and impact of the War on American history and culture from a variety of perspectives - you can see some intriguing archival materials relating to the Civil War in Hampton Roads from the Library’s collection and start a conversation with voices from the past.

I hope to see you in the Library again soon!

 - L.C.

A View From the Stacks: Intern's Journal Week 7

Our wonderful interns Casey and Chelsea have completed their internships and are headed back to school, but they left us with a vivid journal recounting their summer adventures in the Library. This is the last edition of "A View from the Stacks", but I'll be posting the wonderful collections Casey and Chelsea created next week!  

Week 7 - End of the Summer
I’ve reached the last week of my internship and I have one more task and a few more loose-ends to attend to. While we also got to finish the Docent Library and dismantle our book cart, the most exciting portion of the week (so far) was our rare book project, and the hardest is this blog, as it is sadly my last project!

Our final library task involved investigating the value of one of the Jean Outland Chrysler Library’s rare books, and writing a label describing what we found. I chose to research a signed copy of Margaret Bourke-White’s Shooting the Russian War for my interest in the subject and the opportunity to see the famous photographer’s signature up close—it was awesome.

Overall, this project—to me—felt like saving the best for last. It was a thrill to handle a book that is certainly a piece of history in its own right, but also a treasure for its signature. But of the many great opportunities I have had this summer to get acquainted with the museum and its staff, my work in the library has been the most educational and rewarding. I am so grateful to Laura and Sara for their time and guidance, and so sad to be leaving such a great institution!

- Chelsea Reinhardt 2010 Summer Library Intern

Intern's Journal - A View From the Stacks Week 5

Our wonderful interns Casey and Chelsea have completed their internships and are headed back to school, but they left us with a vivid journal recounting their summer adventures in the Library. Stay tuned for future editions of "A View from the Stacks" which will continue to appear on the blog during the next few weeks.

Week 5 – Research


        Research week! My favorite part of art history. While this process feels daunting at first, I’ve found that research always leads me through unexpected avenues and leaves me questioning even long after the project has been completed. For our project, Laura instructed us to find one piece in the collection to research. Our research would be added to the Library’s vertical files in the hopes of bringing them up-to-par with Registration’s files, and helping to lead future researches in the right direction. Once again, I was faced with choosing one piece in a collection of thousands!

Rather than selecting a piece by an artist I was familiar with, I decided to choose one I knew little about, and one whose vertical file was in need of expanding. I wrote down several and then narrowed my choices. In a Northern Renaissance gallery (of course) I stumbled upon a tiny painting by Frans Francken II called Death and the Miser. This painting, with its grim subject, is not one I would ordinarily be drawn to, but one that certainly interested me at first glance. It shows a skeleton serenading a seated old, feeble man. Presumably the same man and skeleton are seen out the window, but the man appears much younger. This image’s small size does not detract from its psychological impact, nor it’s ability to show the artist’s skill. It was a front-runner in my choices, and I soon found out it was lacking a vertical file altogether. I felt that this painting’s ability to attract my attention at such a small size and with such a strange subject earned it the right to live among the library’s vertical files.

After researching online and looking through files in the Registrar's record, I found out there are several reproductions of Death and the Miser, and also that there are several Franz Francken’s – a problem that has plagued connoisseurs and researchers for generations. For the purposes of this project, I decided to note this information, but to coincide with the Chrysler’s identification panel, to attribute the painting to Frans Francken II (or the Younger) . My Pathfinder for future researchers included websites containing relevant information, other paintings by Frans Francken the Yonger, useful publications within and outside the JOCL, and other artists and paintings from Northern Europe depicting similar subjects. I hope this research will help to further the interest of others looking for information about this painting and those of similar subjects.

Also this week, Chelsea and I constructed our Book Cart, inspired by a German do-it-yourself doll-house book. Our dollhouse, while not as glamorous as the dollhouses in this book, was done on a budget of only $10. We used cardboard and masking tape to create faux bricks and hardwood floors. We printed out pictures of windows, appliances, cabinets, wallpaper, and tile floors for the interior, and included my childhood dollhouse furniture. Members of our house include, Dr. Scott Howe, Dr. William Hennessey and even our cataloguing fellow, John Curtis. We hope you enjoy our home-made Puppenhaus!

- Casey Nye, 2010 Summer Library Intern

Interns Journal - A View from the Stacks Week 4

Our wonderful interns Casey and Chelsea have completed their internships and are headed back to school, but they left us with a vivid journal recounting their summer adventures in the Library. Stay tuned for future editions of "A View from the Stacks" which will continue to appear on the blog during the next few weeks.



For week four of our internship we were loosed from the Library and sent to the Education department to perform the seemingly simple task of sorting the Docent library. What at first seemed like a few shelves of roughly categorized material that just needed to be stood upright and recorded soon turned into a week-long foray into the minefield of library cataloging, as well as my favorite internship experience yet. Our work began with an examination of the collections’ materials and purpose. A collection of donated books, the Docent library serves both as a source of quick reference and more in-depth study for Chrysler Museum’s dedicated Docents. Our task was not only to organize the books but to make them quickly accessible by arranging them logically and then cataloging them.

The Docent library before we set to work.

As we got down to the work of recording titles and deciding subjects we encountered the great plague of library organization. While the Library of Congress system provides a structure that arranges books by subject beginning with general art history and moving into mediums, countries of origin and individual artists, some books (and many of the Docent books) cover multiple of these organizing subjects. Placement in the library eventually comes down to individual logic and an executive decision, an issue that complicated work for two beginner-perfectionists

As we made our way though tough names like Mary Cassatt (who, as an American impressionist painter exhibiting in France, was eligible for four of our categories of organization), we settled our disagreements and questions with our supervisor, Laura until, finally, the nearly 600 books of the docent library were recorded and placed in order. For now, we await our second crack at their organization and the completion of our first mini-catalogue. In the meantime, the kinesthetic learner in me cannot wait for my next chance to get hands-on, while the perfectionist in me is eager to complete my task.

- Chelsea Reinhardt 2010 Summer Library Intern

The Seven Thrones Mystery

After most of a week off to officially become a resident of Norfolk (Boston to Norfolk in 16 ft. truck = 14 hours), I was welcomed back with the opportunity to work with some fantastic and sometimes mysterious rare materials. I’ve been able to catalog, among other things, the library’s holdings of an early 20th century magazine called The Craftsman and a rare, artistic box of booklets, multimedia, and sculpture to commemorate a 2004 performance by artist Terence Koh. The latter proves that an item need not be half a century old to be classified as rare; in this case, the Jean Outland Chrysler Library may be the only art library in the world with a copy of the “Koh & 50 Most Beautiful Boy” box, which was produced in very limited quantities.

Most exciting for me, however, was the chance to solve the mystery of a Persian-language book possibly created as far back as 1482. Lacking a staff member able to read what may be an archaic form of Persian script, we’re unable to say with certainty what the text is about. The volume is beautifully illustrated in a Persian miniature style prominent in the 15th and 16th centuries. Adding to the mystery is a loose, typed note with the name and dates of a famous Persian poet, Jami. Clues in hand, I started some online digging through other institution’s catalogs and exhibitions as well as following a Wikipedia trail (yes, I admit it) to Jami, Persian poetry, and miniature painting. When I looked up it was 2 PM and I was momentarily convinced we had a version of Jami’s most famous work, Haft Awrang (Seven Thrones). Unfortunately, my theory remains just that and without being able to read the text, I can only rely on visual characteristics and the beautiful illustrations. Two of the illustrations in our volume match scenes depicted in the most famous Haft Awrang manuscript, currently residing in the Freer Gallery of Art, but the others do not immediately invoke scenes from Jami’s epic work. If nothing else, I had an exciting morning of feeling the smallest bit like a desk-bound Indiana Jones, but hopefully my research can provide another starting point for future catalogers or researchers. The mystery volume remains one of the most intrinsically valuable in our rare collection and stands as a personal highlight for me.

Women at the Chrysler Women and World War II

During the exhibition Women of the Chrysler: A 400-Year Celebration of the Arts, we’re celebrating the contributions of women to the history of the Chrysler Museum. Women from all backgrounds have played an integral role in the creation, development, and operation of the Museum from its very beginning. Each week during the exhibition, we’re a story about a woman or group of women accompanied by images from the Library's collections. This week's contribution was researched and written by Spring Library Intern Victoria Schwab. We invite you to join us in the Library to learn more about these dedicated women.

The women at the Norfolk Museum of Arts and Science were not discouraged by the hardships of World War II; rather they persevered by sustaining art and culture in Norfolk. Members of the Norfolk Society of Arts and Junior League regularly held exhibitions, lectures, and concerts in support of war relief. In 1942, ‘Women of the War Week’ was held to sell defense bonds and stamps encouraging citizens to “Stamp Themselves American.” Additional aid was provided through various shows including the Harvest Show, which raised $1,595.63. Aside from war relief, the Museum sponsored free concerts along with poetry and art competitions for individuals serving in the armed forces. The Museum’s commitment to the arts brought support and encouragement to residence in a time of crisis.

 

 -- Victoria Schwab, Library Intern

Out of Storage and Into the Stacks

Are you a glass collector or enthusiast? This Wednesday May 5 at 6 p.m. the Jean Outland Chrysler Library will host Curator of Glass Kelly Conway in the Library Reading Room for a unique opportunity. Join us for Out of Storage and Into the Stacks and view fine pieces from the Chrysler’s glass collection alongside rare books from the Chrysler Library’s extensive glass research collections. Treasures from both collections will be on display and we will discuss how to use the Library’s resources for glass identification and research.


Whether you already have an extensive collection of glass or would like to learn more, this is a great opportunity to learn how to begin your research.

Space is limited to 20 participants and room is still available, so please R.S.V.P. For more information, contact Laura Christiansen at (757) 965-2035 or at lchristiansen@chrysler.org

Thanks for a Wonderful Saturday Afternoon !

Special thanks to everyone who attended last Saturday's Workshop in the Library. We certainly enjoyed discussing the Library's resources and learning a bit about the many interesting items being researched. Unable to attend but still want to learn how to get started with your research? Keep an eye on the blog for future workshops or stop by the Library for more information.

Are you ready for some research?

There's still time to join us tomorrow,  Saturday January 23, 2010 at 1 p.m. in the Library
for an introduction to using the Jean Outland Chrysler Library’s resources to investigate mystery items in your personal collection. This workshop is free for Friends of the Library, and only $5.00 for others. We look forward to seeing you there!

My Fall Internship at the Jean Outland Chrysler Library

This Fall we were very pleased to welcome Sarah Fowler, a senior at Old Dominion University , as a Library Intern.  Sarah assisted with a number of projects in the Library. We'll certainly miss her, but you can look forward to reading some of her observations about the Library on this blog in the coming weeks. Here's what she had to say about some of the projects she completed:

"I have been working on a wide variety of projects while interning at the library. I began by working with the books that were in need of conserving. I had to go through a large stack of books and piece together those that had fallen apart. From there I had to try to identify the books. This was challenging because many of the books were in other languages like German or French. My next step was to wrap them in acid free paper and then to search for them in the library’s catalogue. I enjoyed this project because I am interested in conservation.

My favorite project involved a box of old photographs. For this project, I had to go through a box of photographs and try to determine the date on which they were taken and who was in the photograph. The box I was working on contained a collection of photographs from the 1950’s of a meeting of NATO in Norfolk. There were also hundreds of photographs from the collection of W.L. Parker who was a former director of the Board of Trustees for the Chrysler Museum. The subject of these photographs was often historical places and landmarks. For example, he took many photos of Colonial Williamsburg and the campus of the University of Virginia. This was my favorite project because after opening an ordinary box I got to discover a lot of interesting photographs and learn a little about who took them and why."

 - Sarah Fowler, Fall 2009 Jean Outland Chrysler Library Intern

Celebrating American Archives Month: Hampton Roads Stories from Our Collections

October is American Archives Month. To celebrate, we thought we would share some of the stories told by items in the archival collections of the Jean Outland Chrysler Library. Each week in October we'll be featuring a story from our archives that reveals part of Hampton Roads history. This week's item, a diary, is a little mysterious...

Can you solve a mystery? – Diary-keeping has always been a popular form of reflection for both men and women. A diary might hold lists of daily activities, family life, travels, or – of course – secrets. The author of this diary is unknown. Writing between 1893 and 1895, the author was a servant on a working farm or estate in New Hampshire. We know what work the author did each day, what food they ate, what books they read (strangely enough, this diarist loved mystery novels), and even what time they got up each morning. We don’t know the name of the person who created this diary, their gender, why the author wrote or how this detailed account of daily life ended up here in Norfolk. Who knows, maybe you can solve the mystery.

Celebrating Archives Month: Hampton Roads Stories from Our Collections

October is American Archives Month. To celebrate,we thought we would share some of the stories told by items in the archival collections of the Jean Outland Chrysler Library. Each week in October we'll be featuring a story from our archives that reveals part of Hampton Roads history.  This week it's the story of a well known (at the time) visitor to our area.

Born in 1868 into infamous wealth as the eldest daughter of New York financier and railroad magnate Jay Gould, Helen Miller Gould (later Helen Miller Shepard) spent her life in philanthropic efforts. Though “Miss Gould” focused on the education of children and the lifting of the less fortunate on the grounds of her home, Lyndhurst, her real love was the Young Men’s Christian Association. She traveled almost yearly on inspection tours of Y.M.C.A.s all over the country. Known for her patriotism and war-relief efforts which began during the Spanish-American War, she gave freely of her time. Miss Gould gave talks, joined in Bible studies and was a general inspiration. She also gave of herself financially, spending millions of dollars to build new facilities and libraries for soldiers and railway men who made use of the organization for social and academic enrichment.

Miss Gould made several visits to Norfolk. She presented a building to troops at Old Point Comfort in the early 1900s and returned for visits and Y.M.C.A. inspections over the years. She gave talks, participated in Bible studies, and encouraged the servicemen in any way possible. In the archives, the Jean Outland Chrysler Library holds images from one of these visits [pictured below].The young men in uniform listen respectfully, presumably to Miss Gould, on one of her visits to the Norfolk Naval Y.M.C.A. The local ladies pause in their conversation with Miss Gould for a photo with the lady of the hour. Want to learn more about Miss Gould's visit to Norfok or other Hampton Roads Stories?  Stop by the Library! 

New York Through My Eyes

During the summer, we asked Interns Emma, Gabrielle, Brendan and Jessica to create a virtual collection by collecting digital images of some aspect of the library collection to be decided by them. For example, they could collect images of bookplates in the collection, of details on binding, books with funny titles, or books on a particular subject – the possibilities were endless. On July 31, at the Library Open House, each collection was presented. In the coming weeks, we’ll be posting each intern’s collection along with a few other posts they created during their time in the Library.



This week’s collection comes from Emma Tisdale who is a student at New York University. Emma described her collection “New York Through My Eyes” as follows:


"The beautiful thing about New York City is that it is the kind of place that can be seen through many different perspectives. A tourist may only see the crowded streets of Times Square while a businessman sees the opportunity for success on Wall Street. A high school drama student may see the city as a place where her dreams of fame could come true. A boy who is misunderstood or ashamed in his own skin could see New York as a place of acceptance. My personal view of New York, which is reflected through the images in my collection, is that of a college student living in Lower Manhattan. I searched for scenes with which I am familiar, such as the marketplace in Union Square, the wildly painted buildings in the Village, and the pedestrians relaxing in Washington Square Park. I also included some older photographs of the New York City’s older architecture, paintings of a green Central Park, and an image of my favorite bookstore. These are the things that I see not only throughout my daily life at school but in my mind as I daydream of New York. My perspective is not one of glamour or crowds. It is just my personal view of the diverse city that has become my home. "


You can view all of the images in Emma's Collection here.

Recent Inquiries

One of the great things about working in the Library is helping visitors to the museum learn more about items in the Chrysler Museum's collections. When answering questions about items in the galleries for students, scholars, and other curious museum patrons, Library staff members have the unique opportunty of viewing the Museum's collections from new and unique perspectives. Here are just three of the many Chrysler Collection items for which information has been requested this week:

Peach Blow Pitcher in Tankard Shape with Rich Decoration,
ca. 1886-90
Blown glass Enamel
Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.
Location: Glass, Gallery 131.R6.C64
With poem: "On waste and woodland, rock and plain,/Its' humble buds unheed rise;/The Rose has but a summer reign;/The daisy never dies!/James Montgomery".

Use of Rouen
French Book of Hours, ca. 1480
Vellum Tempera Gilt Ink
Loan from the Irene Leache Memorial Collection
Location: The Dalis Foundation Galleries of European Art







Larkin Goldsmith Mead American (1835-1910)
The Battle Story (The Returned Soldier)

modeled ca. 1863-65, carved 1865-66

Marble

Gift of James H. Ricau and Museum Purchase

Location: Ricau Gallery

For more information about these items, or about any other items in the Museum collection take a look at the Chrysler Museum's Collection Online, or, stop by the Library - we're here to help.