October is for Archives-Lovers

October is American Archives Month (and North Carolina Archives Month), and here at Davidson’s Archives & Special Collections, we’ve had a busy few weeks of sharing stories, leading class discussions, promoting archival advocacy, and assisting users! Here’s a few highlights of what public-facing activities each member of our team did this month:

Jan Blodgett, College Archivist and Records Management Coordinator:

Promotional poster from the Charlotte Teachers Institute panel that Jan spoke at.
Promotional poster from the Charlotte Teachers Institute panel that Jan spoke at.

Sharon Byrd, Special Collections Outreach Librarian:

  • Planned Ghosts in the Library event, with assistance from Peer Research Advisors
  • Taught, led discussion, or facilitated: ART 215 Intro to Print Media (Tyler Starr), ENG 240 British Lit to 1800 (Gabriel Ford), LAT 202 Int. Latin (Britta Ager), AFR 101 Africana Studies  (Tracy Hucks)
  • Helped lead an archival donor visit (with Caitlin)
The display Sharon and I set up for a donor visit - we pulled collections and objects to highlight the donors' father (an alumnus), as well as the athletic history of Davidson.
The display Sharon and I set up for a donor visit – we pulled collections and objects to highlight the donors’ father (an alumnus), as well as the athletic history of Davidson.

Caitlin Christian-Lamb, Associate Archivist (me!):

  • Helped lead an archival donor visit (with Sharon)
  • Gave a campus historical tour and set up archival exhibition for Pi Kappa Phi alumni reunion (1962 – 1969 classes)
  • Spoke on a Society of North Carolina Archivists‘ panel for current University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill SILS students
  • Taught three sessions of  DIG 350 History & Future of the Book (Mark Sample), and one session of HIS  382 Science and the Body in East Asia (Saeyoung Park)
  • Helped facilitate and attended THATCamp Piedmont (see the schedule and collaborative Google docs here) after a few months of serving on the planning committee
  • Met with students for MAT 110 Finite Mathematics class about archives data visualization projects (with Jan)
  • Gave a short presentation on digital archival resources at the monthly education and technology gathering on campus (GitPub)
Pi Kappa Phi Epsilon chapter alumni (class of 1962-69) listen to an overview of what's changed on front campus in the last 50 years.
Pi Kappa Phi Epsilon chapter alumni (classes of 1962-69) listen to an overview of what’s changed on front campus in the last 50 years.

We also have a few more upcoming public events. Tonight all three members of Archives & Special Collections will be at Ghosts in the Library – come to the Smith Rare Book Room on the second floor of the library at 8:00 PM to hear scary stories and eat delicious treats. Tomorrow (October 30th), Jan and I will be participating in #AskAnArchivist Day, a national archival outreach initiative – simply tweet a question and #AskAnArchivist to @DavidsonArchive, and we’ll tell you everything we know! Early next month, on November 8th, the first ever Piedmont Triad Home Movie Day/ Personal Digital Archiving Day will be held at Wake Forest University’s library – HMD/PDAD is co-hosted and co-planned by the archives and library staff of Davidson College and Wake Forest University. Come watch college archival footage, share your own home movies, and learn basic digital preservation tips!

The Art of Illumination: Interview with Clara Nguyen

The latest display in the Smith Rare Book Room is “The Art of Illumination: Past and Present,” which will be on view from today (January 15) through February 14. The display focuses on illuminations throughout time, illustrated by examples from the library’s special collections and two new pieces by Clara Nguyen, the Collections Assistant for Government Information here at E.H. Little Library. Clara previously served as the Interim Assistant Curator of the Van Every/ Smith Galleries, and holds a B.A. in Art History (with a studio concentration) from East Carolina University and a M.A. in Art History from the George Washington University.

Clara first became interested in illuminations through an internship at the Ellen Frank Illumination Arts Foundation (EFIAF), where she worked on the Book of Judith. Formed in 2004, EFIAF aims to “revitalize passion for and public awareness of the art of illumination, in part through education and training at the unique Illumination Atelier.” Similarly, when I interviewed Clara last week, she emphasized both the ancient and modern aspects of illumination: “I try to use natural materials because I’m trying to keep in the tradition of illumination.”  She uses many of the same materials as the older works on display, such as: papyrus (typically used for practice pieces), vellum (reserved exclusively for final pieces), 23 K leaf, egg tempera, Indian ink, fish glue, bole (Armenian red clay and water), rabbit glue, and garlic glue. Don’t expect Clara’s work to look like a medieval manuscript, though – she says that she “likes taking physical images and then making them abstract;” much of her work is inspired by nature, including one of her pieces in the Rare Book Room display, which is based on an outing on the Davidson cross country trail.

Two views of, “The Vines” “Amongst the birds they writhe breathing with the clouds but on the ground they lie - forgotten”
Two views of “The Vines”
“Amongst the birds
they writhe
breathing with the clouds
but on the ground
they lie –
forgotten”

Part of what drew Clara to illuminations was how the materials used force the artistic process: “It’s a fickle medium. You can mold it to where you want it to go… to a degree.” When asked about the creative process, she cited an example her mentor, Dr. Anne Collins Goodyear, gave when describing how ideas are developed: “A man (or woman) is walking and thinking. He waits at the bus stop for his bus to come along, still contemplating but not fully focused on his thoughts. The bus arrives and it is when he takes his first step onto the bus that the ‘idea/inspiration’ strikes him. It is in this in-between state of things that all the pieces finally click and solidify. I feel that my initial creative process occurs in this way. In other words, my mind is quietly thinking with all these ideas and one final element usually ties it all together. In my pieces, the tying element is usually based in nature and occasionally, a man-made element.” One idea formed in such a way inspired a piece in our display: “I was driving one day and saw a smokestack and thought, “Huh… I want that in there, I just don’t know how I want it yet.”

The piece inspired by the smokestack:  “The wheels spin and like smoke obliterate the -”
The piece inspired by the smokestack:
“The wheels
spin
and like smoke
obliterate
the -”

After the seed for the idea has been planted, Clara can then turn to implementing and shaping it: “Once I have an idea, I make a few sketches to lay out the general shapes. I transfer these shapes onto the papyrus/vellum using a very light pencil. Thereafter follows the fun part of the process: I begin an additive process of painting, drawing with quill and Indian ink, and leafing. Like most contemporary illuminators, I work using a 5-diopter glass lens which increases the viewed object size to 225%.”

For those interested in seeing Clara’s process in person, she will be giving an informal live demonstration of illumination techniques on January 28th, from 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM, in the Library’s Davidsoniana Room (second floor of E.H. Little Library). Feel free to stay for the hour, or stop by for a few minutes. Light refreshments will be served, and questions and comments are welcomed! As Clara said during our interview, “It’s a lot of fun seeing the connections people make and what they see.”

Physical to Digital and Back to Physical Again: 3D Scanning and Printing

Davidson recently unveiled a new makerspace, Studio M, which will provide a wealth of opportunities for students and the college community to experiment with new technologies. After attending the open house two weeks ago, we began to think about archival collaborations with the makerspace – how can we leverage these new resources with those already existing in the library?

The cuneiform collection has already been scanned and added to the Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (CDLI), but what if the college’s oldest objects were 3D scanned and printed in a more durable, lend-able form? The Archives & Special Collections team rolled up our sleeves and began to brainstorm about items from the college’s collections that could use a good scanning, for either preservation or use (or both). The Smithsonian Institution’s 3D digitization work provides inspiration what the affordances of this kind of digital inquiry could be:
One of the first collections we thought of was that of  Gordon Clift Horton (class of 1942) – Horton was the engine behind the first Annual Student Exhibition, and he went on to study interior design at Parsons School of Design (now Parsons the New School for Design). When his mother, Florence Clift Horton, passed away in 1975, she willed her estate to Davidson College, and several of Gordon Horton’s collections can still be found on campus. Horton’s collection of jade figurines could be an interesting scanning project…

A jade Budai from the Horton collection
A jade Budai from the Horton collection

Student medals and badges also provide a unique 3D digitization opportunity – these medals were created for the Eumenean and Philanthropic Literary Societies, and each comes imbued with stories of previous generations of Davidson students. A literary society badge could be scanned, and the resulting 3D model could be altered to reflect the name of a current student organization, providing a physical manifestation of the past of Davidson’s student groups for those in the present.

A tray of Eu and Phi medals from the 19th century
A tray of Eu and Phi medals from the 19th century
A Eumenean Society badge, which belonged to Joel Mable (class of 1864)
A Eumenean Society badge, which belonged to Joel Mable (class of 1864)

While these are just ideas at the present, we’ll have more news to share in a few months.  Watch this space to see which of these visions becomes a reality!