Category: Exhibits

August 4 – mid-November 2016.
Flat and Wall Cases

The new exhibit in the library’s flat and wall cases is “Realia: Objects from the Archives”. The Reed College Special Collections contain many objects from the history of the college, its founders, and its activities. These are documented and stored in the library’s many rooms devoted to special collections and archives. They range from the wooden palanquin on which the flaming boar’s head was carried in earlier years to Simeon Reed’s fishing pole. A selection of these items allows us to see a real piece of Reed and to help us imagine the life of the mind in previous decades.

April 11- May 3, 2016
Flat and Wall Cases

The Guerrilla Girls are a small group of women outraged at the inequality in the art world over how few women are shown, reviewed, selected as playwrights, or accepted but also in the larger world of women’s rights, status, and politics.  The library owns a large collection of their posters from 1985 to the present; these and many others are on display around the campus, with copies mounted all over in guerrilla fashion.

March 10 – May 31, 2016
Flat and Wall Cases

The new exhibit focuses on the Book of Kells and its Insular Script, a half-uncial form of handwriting, and Celtic ornamentation. The library’s excellent facsimile of the Book of Kells (1990) is on display along with other research on the manuscript, a note about Celtic decoration, and the connection between Reed and the study of this early hand. The exhibit accompanies the Book of Kells events planned for April 2, 2016, of discussions, demonstrations, and lectures on the Book of Kells and the monastic Irish culture that produced it.

August 18, 2015 through November, 2015
Library’s flat and wall cases

The art of bookbindings mirror in miniature the changes in style and design in the world around us. From the 16th century to the present, books in this exhibit have been selected from the Reed collections to show the breadth of these designs, from the vellum covering of a sewn-through-the-fold paper text block to the accordion-folded artist’s book. Displayed are various binding structures, examples of endpaper designs, early bindings, publishers’ stamped cloth bindings, and the creativity of book artists.

May 1 – June 15, 2015
Library flat and wall cases

This exhibit highlights how the political and social phenomena experienced across the U.S. unfolded on campus. The students of History 309, taught by Shane Dillingham this semester, explored youth culture and social movements throughout Latin America during the long ’60s, contextualized into a global perspective. In their investigation of Reed College’s engagement with black politics, women’s liberation, and U.S. foreign policy, they concluded that while Reed is rightly regarded as a very insular, somewhat myopic space, the campus was not immune to the influences of social and ideological forces from around the globe.

January 15 – April 15, 2015
Flat Library Cases

The world-renowned fashion designer, Emilio Pucci, had a special relationship with Reed College, having attended Reed in 1936/37. President Dexter Keezer traded tuition, room, and board for Pucci’s time and expertise as a ski instructor, giving Reed the first ski team and, incidentally, giving the world the first of Pucci’s designs with the ski uniforms. On display are items, photos, and documents that connect Pucci to Reed and follow his long association with the college.