Jason's Grey Cells

Winston and a Yucca.

Sat, 18 May 2013 18:00:28 -0500

Winston and a Yucca.

Dallas!

Sat, 18 May 2013 17:58:00 -0500

Dallas!

(via Marfa Voices sample trailer for NEA on Vimeo)

Sat, 18 May 2013 12:30:24 -0500

(via Marfa Voices sample trailer for NEA on Vimeo)

Exercising: Oklahoma style?

Sat, 18 May 2013 08:22:35 -0500

Exercising: Oklahoma style?

Calder in the afternoon

Fri, 17 May 2013 14:05:36 -0500

Calder in the afternoon

The Jolly Flatboatmen have arrived, in all their jovial...

Fri, 17 May 2013 13:46:39 -0500

The Jolly Flatboatmen have arrived, in all their jovial splendor…

librarysciences: My 40-pound lapdog is helping me study.

Fri, 17 May 2013 12:30:25 -0500

librarysciences:

My 40-pound lapdog is helping me study.

And now, your Friday Ephemera Seen While Cataloging.

Fri, 17 May 2013 11:00:47 -0500

And now, your Friday Ephemera Seen While Cataloging.

bookconservator: book-and-slug-club: To add a library to a...

Thu, 16 May 2013 12:30:13 -0500

bookconservator:

book-and-slug-club:

To add a library to a house is to give that house a soul

One day..

kaiyves: I’m sorry, has this joke been done before? ELON MUSK...

Thu, 16 May 2013 08:10:52 -0500

kaiyves:

I’m sorry, has this joke been done before?

ELON MUSK IS NOT AMUSED.

nprfreshair: Robert Caro, who has spent the past 37 years,...

Wed, 15 May 2013 16:58:24 -0500

nprfreshair:

Robert Caro, who has spent the past 37 years, writing his multi-volume biography of Lyndon Johnson, tells Dave Davies about how Johnson was a “great reader of men”:

When a new aide, a young aide [arrived] … he’d tell them how to talk to someone. He’d say, ‘Watch their eyes. Watch their hands. What they’re telling you with their eyes or their hands is more important than what they’re telling you with their mouth.’ He used to say, ‘Never let a conversation end because there’s always something that the man doesn’t want to tell you and the longer a conversation goes on, the easier it is for you to figure out what it is he doesn’t want to tell you.’ He had a unique ability to know what a man really wanted, what a man really was afraid of and of playing on those fears and those desires.”

LBJLibrary photo by Yoichi Okakmoto

Truth: this photo is my desktop wallpaper.

theolduvaigorge: The ‘walking’ megalithic statues (moai) of...

Wed, 15 May 2013 12:30:17 -0500

theolduvaigorge:

The ‘walking’ megalithic statues (moai) of Easter Island

by Carl P. Lipo, Terry L. Hunt and Sergio Rapu Haoa

“Explaining how the monumental statues (moai) of Easter Island were transported has remained open to debate and speculation, including their resource expenditures and role in deforestation. Archaeological evidence including analysis of moai variability, particularly those abandoned along ancient roads, indicates transport was achieved in a vertical position. To test this proposition we constructed a precise three-dimensional 4.35 metric ton replica of an actual statue and demonstrate how positioning the center of mass allowed it to fall forward and rock from side to side causing it to ‘walk.’ Our experiments reveal how the statue form was engineered for efficient transport by a small number of individuals.

We show how Easter Island statue variability is explained by transport in a vertical position. ► We ‘walk’ a precise road statue replica demonstrating how form enables vertical transport. ► ‘Walking’ multi-ton statues did not require timber and could be accomplished by relatively small groups” (read more).

***I don’t often post non-Palaeolithic articles, but this was too cool and the images were great.

(Source: Journal of Archaeological Science, 2013, in press)

Hill, John, Joshua Shaw, John Hill, and James Maxwell....

Wed, 15 May 2013 10:00:46 -0500

Hill, John, Joshua Shaw, John Hill, and James Maxwell. Picturesque Views of American Scenery.: 1820. Philadelphia: Published by M. Carey & Son, 1820.

Remember a few weeks ago when I was talking about creating color images for books by using aquatints? I want to talk with you today about another example of a book produced using aquatints by one of the American masters of the process and his work with another emigrant, Joshua Shaw.

Joshua Shaw’s most well-known book is his Hudson River Portfolio widely considered to be the highest expression both of aqatinting, as well as color view books in the first half of the 19th century. Joshua Shaw came to the United States in 1817, and brought with him training as a landscape painter, a letter of reference from the American ex-pat Benjamin West, and a keen interest in illustrating things that were uniquely American - landscapes being at the forefront of this interest. As a result of this interest, Shaw took a trip from New York to Georgia, and made drawings during the trip. While in the field on this trip, he had the foresight to sign people up on the spot as subscribers to the book he would create based on the drawings. Shaw’s introduction states:

Our country abounds with Scenery, comprehending all the varieties of the sublime, the beautiful, and the picturesque in nature, worthy to engage the skill of an Artist in their delineation; and as no well-executed work of this description has ever been produced, it is confidently hoped that the present will meet with due encouragement. Mr. Shaw, whose merits in this line have been honoured with the commendation of Mr. West, is travelling through the different states, for the purpose of taking on the spot, the best and most popular Views…In the course of his tour he will visit nearly EVERY STATE IN THE UNION.

Perhaps realizing both the novelty of the American landscape and its relatively unpublished status vis a vis color images, Shaw set out to make books of American views, both with his Hudson River Portfolio (his most well-known book) as well as this item, his Picturesque Views of American Scenery. His timing was also prescient, as American artists such as Thomas Cole and Asher B. Durand began to paint images of the American landscape, referred to colloquially as the Hudson River school of painting.

Shaw was clearly familiar with color printers and engravers of the time, and had the forethought to have John Hill engrave the plates for this book and the Hudson River Portfolio. Like Shaw, Hill was an immigrant to the United States from England, arriving in 1816. He was without any significant rivals in creating aquatints, but initially found little work in the United States, as the process was expensive and relatively unknown, as compared to engravings, the dominant form of the nascent color image printing industry. Early on in his career in the United States, Hill became involved with the Philadelphia publisher Moses Thomas. It was this involvement that led to the production of the Picturesque Views of American Scenery.

Shaw engaged Moses Thomas to publish this item in 1819, and this first edition is now exceedingly rare. The plates illustrated above are from the second issue of 1820, with the exception of plate 8 (Falls of the St. Anthony) which is from the Ash reprint of 1829 or 1835.

Both Shaw and Hill were quite ambitious, as they announced their desire to create six numbers of six plates each, offered by subscription. Indeed, their ambition is surprising, as the Picturesque Views was the first large-format book of views to be created in the United States. The first publisher, Moses Thomas, backed out of the project after the titlepage plate (illustrated above) was engraved and struck, highlighting the risk and ambition of both Shaw and Hill. At the conclusion of the project, though, only three of the projected six numbers were issued. Despite not living up to its creators grand goal, the Picturesque Views are both a landmark early American color and viewbook, as well as a lovely and interesting set of views by a well-respected artist and master printer. Gloria Deak acknowledges this in her entry for the item, in her Picturing America:

It was a foundation book for American colored-plate publication, being the first publication in the United States of large colored landscapes essentially scenic in effect…Handsome in execution and coloring, the American Scenery encouraged later artists and engravers to reproduce landscapes for sale. Lastly, and more important insofar as Hill was concerned, it directed attention to him as a master of the mysterious medium of aquatint wherein his American predecessors were by comparison mere dabblers’”.

Some references for you:

nprfreshair: Good morning. Here is the Tobias Funke audition...

Wed, 15 May 2013 08:22:38 -0500

nprfreshair:

Good morning. Here is the Tobias Funke audition reel you’ve been waiting for.

SO ready for AD to come back!

I think this is a still from one of my favorite movies: Bullitt.

Wed, 15 May 2013 08:03:19 -0500

I think this is a still from one of my favorite movies: Bullitt.

awesomearchives: runjuliet: Kids, the lesson is: When you have a small staff and a huge backlog,...

Tue, 14 May 2013 12:30:30 -0500

awesomearchives:

runjuliet:

Kids, the lesson is: When you have a small staff and a huge backlog, don’t go with open-source systems. Because then your sys admin becomes a one-man development team, and your librarians and archivists spend half their time trouble-shooting instead of processing the huge backlog.

Buy something already built. Buy something pretty.

I learned this lesson while in school, thankfully. One too many times saying, “Oh, I’ll build this myself.”

humanweekday: Vampire Holiday

Tue, 14 May 2013 10:00:38 -0500

humanweekday:

Vampire Holiday

ex-tabulis: libralthinking: A Special Collections video that...

Mon, 13 May 2013 12:30:22 -0500

ex-tabulis:

libralthinking:

A Special Collections video that doesn’t suck! With a welcome call out to undergrads! Good job, University of Oklahoma - Good job!!! *clap* The animation where Copernicus’ view of the Universe spins off the page - WHOA!

This is fancy!

"Caro has learned about Johnson’s rages, his ruthlessness, his lies, his bribes, his insecurities,..."

Mon, 13 May 2013 09:26:19 -0500

“Caro has learned about Johnson’s rages, his ruthlessness, his lies, his bribes, his insecurities, his wheedling, his groveling, his bluster, his sycophancy, his charm, his kindness, his streak of compassion, his friends, his enemies, his girlfriends, his gofers and bagmen, his table manners, his drinking habits, even his nickname for his penis: not Johnson, but Jumbo.”

- From “Robert Caro’s Big Dig” by Charles McGrath in The New York Times Magazine, April 12, 2012. Today on the show, Dave Davies talks with the man who has spent the last 37 years writing a multi-volume biography of Lyndon Johnson. The fourth volume, Passage of Power, is out now in paperback. (via nprfreshair)

I know what I’ll be listening to on my way home…

myjetpack: My new book of cartoons “You’re All Just Jealous...

Mon, 13 May 2013 08:11:24 -0500

myjetpack:

My new book of cartoons “You’re All Just Jealous of My Jetpack” is out now. Details are here.