The Arts and Primary Sources

I loved the ability to geek out on books today! I am always a little worried that introducing some of these artifacts to a group of high schools students would just bore them (I did drag my husband through the Rare Books Tour and he that it was interesting but did not really enjoy it). That said, I love the idea that Joe had about using the signed confession from the witch trials as the opening for a discussion about the current state of our legal system and police brutality. I teach Th Crucible and do discuss our current political system but I would like to bring these ideas together to have more of an impact.

Thank you for the field trip this morning! The Rare Book Department looks like an incredible place to visit. The artifacts that were shared this morning were fascinating-and I couldn't get past the idea that these centuries-old clay tiles and books were being handled with bare hands. Every museum I have ever gone to does not let you near the art, especially sculptures, let alone being able to touch them. With that being said, I feel that myself as well as my students would benefit more from seeing the actual artifacts in person. For me, it is awesome to see these items on a screen, but nothing compares to seeing them in person.

Before Covid, I took advantage of a program offered to Bucks County schools called the Artmobile, which is a travelling art gallery. The Artmobile comes to your school and stays there long enough for your entire school to visit. It is awesome for elementary and the students love it. I was intrigued to learn more about the Free Library of Philadelphia's Travelling Treasures, as any opportunity to invite artists into the school setting works much better than choosing only 1 grade level to take on a trip.

I looked into the Travelling Treasures, and it seems that this would be not be a good option for my school setting, due to timing and schedule restraints that are out of my control. I think it's wonderful that the digitized images are available for use, in particular the woodcut block and the copper plate etching, which would be a great addition to my printmaking unit.

I agree that the biggest problem with cultural collections is accessibility. I used to take students to museums, but the logistics of chaperones, permission forms, bus transportation, lunch, and concern about behavior made this stressful for me, although a life changing memory for the students. Online digital sharing opens these locked, guarded, admission-costing treasures to anyone, anywhere, at any time, often for free or a donation. What a change from exclusive visitors with time, money, transportation -- to universal availability! No white gloves needed online to examine rare manuscripts!

What a wonderful presentation this morning. Where to start? Today’s selections were a potent catalyst for specific lesson and unit building but also discussion questions. Questions to develop with classes or for projects (even among the youngest learners) can include:

Do the generic woodcut illustrations found and reused throughout The Nuremburg Chronicle to illustrate more than one place or event matter to you? (I’d love to hear opposing sides from a first grader.) How do we know what is important on a book page of today? What about a page from 300 hundred years ago? Why do different book formats appear through time? What formats would best suit certain genres of books? Questions regarding the economy of making books, comparisons between religious traditions in book decoration, or even issues of book ownership and use can all be adapted to discussions with young readers since most topics can be distilled into vocabulary that the young can attempt to wrestle with.

Outside the LOC digitized collection I’d most likely use the Free Library rare books collection and their Rosenbech collection since I’ve now been familiarized with a staff member and its offerings. But I would be also willing to investigate the Library Company since it was recommended and it’s got the Ben Franklin cred. I’ll be looking into the Traveling Treasures opportunity for sure.

Since art doesn’t exist in a vacuum, using rare and historical texts lends a natural collaboration with ELA teachers (comparing alphabets across cultures and time, book making, children’s books), social studies teachers (too many ideas to name), science teachers (the science behind the materials, early scientific textbooks and illustration) or early instructional manuals could be compared with the teaching of students’ PE, music, or STEM materials used by today’s teachers. The ideas are endless really.

Great questions offered that could really work those students' critical-thinking skills, as well as suggestions for teachers of all subject areas. True, primary sources could be used in all disciplines to engage students in discovery and inquiry. Well done.

I am currently located in Reading, Pennsylvania where we have a modest yet splendid museum- The Reading Public Museum. It has an impressive permanent collection, including a gallery of ancient civilizations and their art - something Joe Shemtov would be pleased with.

https://www.readingpublicmuseum.org/ancient-civilizations-gallery

In the past, we have taken students to the local museum, as well as the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and museums in New York City, including the Met and the MoMa.

Last year, of course, was an off year due to Covid, but I am very relieved that there are people like Joe who allow for virtual field trips such as the one we all took on Monday.

In one way, virtual museum visits are superior to in person visits because the presenter can display the artifact under a camera and allow students to view it up close and personal; something that would be hard to achieve in an in-person setting.

Virtual field trips also eliminate the torturous bus rides as well!

I agree that online collections could be a daily part of learning/research instead of a once a year extravaganza that might be cancelled or missed due to weather or illness. Especially for children whose parents are unable to take them to museums (for many reasons), this is an empowering resource that might even replace video games!?

I have been thinking about my local sources and have to mention The Ohio State University Libraries. Fortunately the community college that I partner with is part of the OSU umbrella.

I have at my fingertips enough information to put me in a coma for years, but I can share just a few links that are notable.

The Ohio State University Library

https://library.osu.edu/

Specifically the Digital Library Collection

https://library.osu.edu/dc

Special Collections

https://library.osu.edu/special-collections

Edited

I thoroughly enjoyed Joe's presentation, his critical thinking, and his question stems as he lead us through the history of the book. I've never been to the Free Library of Philadelphia, and I can see I'm missing some treasures! I think my breath left my body when he showed us the cuneiform tablet and its envelope. I never realized how small cuneiform tablets could be, and I can imagine adults and kids love to be able to see originals on display. I was thinking afterwards that it would be fun to give a similarly sized piece of clay to kids and see what they would write. What would their message be to our world? I also enjoyed seeing the lovely illuminated Book of Hours from the 15th century. The lapis and gold in this example were so bright!

My elementary school is not too far from Reading, Pennsylvania. I looked at the Reading Public Museum's website. https://www.readingpublicmuseum.org/

They have a fun exhibit right now called "Brick City" with lego. This features buildings from around the world. My learners would love to see that. We are really working on having a global perspective at school, and I think the Lego Build exhibit also pairs nicely with STEM. The Museum is part of the Philadelphia Art Museum's (PMA) Art Bridges initiative. The PMA has loaned an exhibit that is on view there now: "In Nature's Studio: Exploring Pennsylvania's Waterways." (Landforms and water forms are part of the kindergarten curriculum.)

When I searched in the paper collection, I found a bifolio from the book of hours 1464/1494.

https://artsandculture.google.com/asset/bifolio-from-book-of-hours/pQG7xxTcUySI2w

I love the initial D and the illustrations. I think my learners would be able to relate to this page.

Edited

(I just lost my second revised comment... Trying again.) Kevin showed us how typography changed over 500 years, then Joe showed us the evolution of writing over thousands of years. Historical perspectives show how "civilization" grows gradually, often cycling back before advancing. Museums display items from "how things used to be," so we can compare/contrast them to now. Presentation doesn't mean affirmation-- showing slave shackles evokes horror and remorse ( chains and cuffs are still used on some potentially innocent prisoners). A recent workshop at the CT Historical Society noted how underwear affected women's freedom. Corsets and bustles impaired breathing and movement, bloomers allowed women to ride bikes! Now they compete in the Olympics in spandex.

As institutions re-evaluate their purpose, they must identify (rather than hide) past mistakes needing repair, rather than being perpetuated. An educational way to use "outmoded" art museum items (traditional focus on white men, power, and wealth) is to juxtapose them to inclusive alternatives. The Guerrilla Girls staged many effective protests about so few women's artworks in museums. Now institutions finally realize they must update their collections, audiences, boards, and staff to represent the whole population, not just the privileged. By admitting the attitudes, assumptions, values, prejudices, habits, and blind spots of the past, they can change detrimental policies to open access to cultural/intellectual resources for the 21st century. For example, who can afford to go to ballets, plays, symphonies, colleges? Yet these organizations are always fundraising.... Only libraries are free and equal to all, sometimes the only source of warmth and a chair for the homeless, a place of choice, discovery, and independence; worth more than an expensive degree, because we never graduate from lifelong learning!

I really enjoyed Joe's presentation yesterday, and immediately saw ways in which it could supplement my curriculum for my Art History and Design classes. I particularly appreciate the critical thinking questions posed. Aside from the great value in the conversations, I also see these discussions as way to keep students engaged in the current material, while perhaps providing inspiration for how they see and make contemporary art. I would love to be able to bring a group of students to the Free Library, though field trips can get a little sticky. It is nice to know that Zoom exists as a "Plan B!"

Here in Lancaster, we have a little gem that is definitely a feasible trip, the Heritage Press Museum! http://www.918club.org/about/. I have been there with scouts, and the boys all got a chance to operate the press.I would be curious to check out the space and opportunities they have at Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology--also very nearby.

Relatedly, here is a fun event happening in September: https://www.lancasterprintersfair.org/. The Printers Fair happens during the evening/weekend, so I will definitely encourage/entice my students to attend.

Thanks for the tip about the Heritage Press Museum. Getting to see how letterpress works and having a hands-on experience is so memorable.

I didn't expect to enjoy being on a virtual field trip as much as I did on Monday. Joe is pretty compelling on the screen. I loved having a chance to view these very cool artifacts and learn about the history books and text.

It makes me wonder...what will be the reading artifacts for students in the next century? How would today's digital artifacts be preserved and presented?

The main branch of the Free Library is an accessible place. My students tend not to be library users. Few of them have library cards. Making a trip here -or setting up one at a branch closer to our school- could offer an incentive for students to continue exploring on their own.

I ask myself the same questions, Amy.

Edited

Eric, I hope you will share these responses with Joe when they all come in! As our thank you notes. After his ardent presentation, I noticed the LOC has some Dead Sea scrolls, 1000 Years of the Persian Book, To Know Wisdom-- American Printing, and other materials related to the Free Library resources.There is way too much to comprehend, but at least we are starting to realize how much is out there, and sort of how to locate it. A treasure map!

Joe's presentation was a treat - it is wild to see ancient tablets in real life (or virtually in our case). For students, the rare books collection can serve as a timeline of the evolution of printing technology, from writing on clay tablets to moveable type. You can discuss these advanced with students, but flat images on their screens don't compare to being able to see and hold actual artifacts.

I visited the Library of Congress in 2019 and was lucky enough to see the "Hope for America" exhibit about how entertainers have commented on and intersected with politicians throughout American history. It would have been a fabulous exhibit for a social studies class to visit to reflect on the the freedom of the press and the American tradition of comedians poking fun at politicians and, in many cases, keeping politicians accountable.

Despite being a native and current Philadelphian and visiting the Free Library's Parkway Central Library many, many, times, I really had no idea of the depth of the special collections and rare books departments. Joe Shemtov's presentation was eye-opening.

I have taken students to the Parkway Central Library once, for an author event, and to a neighborhood branch several times. The South Philadelphia elementary school where I teach now is fortunately an easy bus ride to many cultural institutions, including Betsy Ross House, the Franklin Institute, and the Penn Museum. Now we have a reason to go to the Parkway Central Library, too. I'm especially interested to see student reactions to the Children's Book and Illustrator Collections. I think that the students would gain a lot of perspective on how books, including both text and illustrations, have changed over the years by looking at the Early American collection. I also am impressed that there is a Beatrix Potter Collection, and think that looking at the components of the creative process will be illuminating for students. My students have always been excited and proud when we bind their stories and other published texts together, however simply, into a multi-page book. Ideally seeing the way Potter worked will be inspiring.

I do note that regrettably the only other geography-based collection for children's books, besides the Early American one, is European. While I know that there are different sized markets for children's books in different countries and on different continents, and that our alphabet-based writing system originally lent itself to printing more than character-based writing systems, surely by now there are examples of children's books from all continents. My hope is that the children's book collection will be more linguistically and geographically diverse in the future.

Still, The History of the Book Collection, starting with cuneiform tiles and including European and Oriental (could this term be updated?) manuscripts is impressively multilingual, so if it is possible for my students, many of whom are multilingual, to see both collections, that would be wonderful. I want them to feel validated in their multilingualism and see that important texts exist in many languages. While our school only offers instruction in English, learning and scholarly pursuits can happen in any language.

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