CHICAGO (March 20, 2006) - The Newberry Library, Chicago's home for the humanities since 1887, is offering a variety of public programming that showcases the Library's collections in new ways. This summer's events range from a Newberry favorite - the 22nd Annual Book Fair and Bughouse Square Debates - to local artist Antonia Contro's site-specific installation on the Library's first floor. Programs are free (unless otherwise indicated) and no reservations are typically required.
General information:
Location: 60 West Walton Street, Chicago IL 60610
Public Information: Call (312) 255-3700 or visit www.newberry.org.
Exhibit Hours: Monday, Friday, and Saturday, 8:15 am - 5:30 pm
Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, 8:15 am - 7:30 pm
May 2006
Haymarket at 120
Death in the Haymarket: A Story of Chicago, the First Labor Movement, and the Bombing That Divided Gilded Age America
Saturday, May 6, 11:00 am
The strike for the eight-hour workday, the bomb attack on the police, and the trial and execution of four anarchist labor leaders-the story of the Haymarket affair, 1886-1887, may well be the most compelling and dramatic event in Chicago history. In Death in the Haymarket, historian James Green views Haymarket as a turning point in American history that set the stage for a half-century of attacks, often violent, on working people in America-attacks that too often led to workers' defeats in struggles to improve their lives.
The Newberry Consort: "Tender Mercies: Bad Luck, Bad Behavior, and Forgiveness"
May 11-14
Don't miss the Newberry Consort's season finale-a Mother's day tribute to the Mother of all mothers, whose merciful and understanding heart is always open to the foolish, feckless, devoted believer.
May 11, 3:00 pm, open rehearsal, Newberry Library
May 12, 8:00 pm performance with pre-concert lecture at 7:00 pm, Newberry Library
May 13, 8:00 pm performance with pre-concert lecture at 7:00 pm, University of Chicago Fulton Hall
May 14, 3:00 pm, matinee, Northwestern University Lutkin Hall
Closed and Open: Antonia Contro
May 17 - July 15
Three years ago in a rented summer cottage, Chicago artist Antonia Contro discovered a set of the renowned eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911), started perusing them, and couldn't put them down. Ultimately, a subject from each of the 28 volumes was selected as a starting point for A-ZYM, an "encyclopedic" group of drawing and photography-based works. With A-ZYM as the centerpiece of an extensive body of work based on collected and codified knowledge, Contro will install her own art alongside books, manuscripts, and maps from the Newberry Library's deep humanities collections, which she selected in collaboration with Newberry scholars, librarians, and staff. The stunning result is the exhibition, Closed and Open: Antonia Contro, which opens May 17 and continues through July 15, 2006.
June 2006
From the Great Chain of Being to the Encyclopaedia Britannica 11 to the Internet: Designing the Architecture of Knowledge
Thursday, June 1, 6:00 pm
A panel of scholars and editors engaged in the historical study of the organization of knowledge will discuss what today's cyber-geeks can learn from the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century creators of encyclopedias, taxonomies, and dictionaries.
Chair: Sara Austin, The Newberry Library
Panelists, Erin McKean, Oxford American Dictionary; Edward Valauskas, Chicago Botanic Garden, and Theodore Pappas, Encyclopaedia Britannica
SAVE the DATE - Annual Spring Gala
June 12, 6:00 PM
Tickets start at $350 per person. For more information, call (312) 255-3510.
Art in Context: Everything you always wanted to know about Chicago's contemporary art scene
Thursday, June 15, 6:00 pm
Art critic Jim Yood will place Antonia Contro's site-specific exhibition, Closed and Open, in the context of 21st century art for people who are curious (but feel "clueless") about what today's artists are up to.
L. Frank Baum and Oz
Saturday, June 17, 11:00 am
Why have the Wizard of Oz books been banned from schools and librarians since Baum wrote the very first book in the series of fourteen in 1900? Meet Angela Carpenter who has all the answers. She is the author of L. Frank Baum: Royal Historian of Oz , and President of the International Wizard of Oz Club, which is meeting in Naperville the weekend of the 17th.
Julius Rosenwald: The Man Who Built Sears, Roebuck and Advanced the Cause of Black Education in the American South
Tuesday, June 27, 6:00 pm
Historian Peter Ascoli discusses his sensitive and perceptive biography of his grandfather, Julius Rosenwald, entrepreneur and philanthropist extraordinaire. Co-sponsored by the Chicago Jewish Historical Society.
July 2006
Millennium Park: Creating a Chicago Landmark
Saturday, July 8, 11:00 am
Chicago's Millennium Park has been hailed as one of the most important millennium projects in the world, and Tim Gilfoyle's biography of the Park is equally unprecedented. He begins before 1850, when the site was submerged in Lake Michigan and encompasses interviews with the planners, artists, and public officials who planned and built the Park, which opened in 2004.
22nd Annual Newberry Library Book Fair
Thursday, July 27, 2006, from 12:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Friday, July 28, 2006, from 12:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Saturday, July 29, 2006, from 10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Sunday, July 30, 2006, from 10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Feed your bibliomania at the Newberry's annual Book Fair! More than 100,000 donated books have been sorted into 50 categories for your browsing convenience. With many books priced under $2, it's easy to replenish your home library's holdings on subjects ranging from antiques to zoology.
Admission is free; for information call (312) 255-3510. Parking is available at 100 W. Chestnut, 1025 N. Clark, or 100 E. Walton for $6 for up to six hours with Newberry validation.
Bughouse Square Debates
Saturday, July 29, 11:00 am to 6:00 pm
Relive the days of soapbox oratory and public debates that immortalized Washington Square Park. Celebrate Chicago's long history as a hub of free speech with soap boxers and a compelling main debate. An open mic, and musical entertainment by folksingers Bucky Halker and Jimmy Tomasello and blues artists Johnnie May Dunson and Jimmi "Prime Time" Smith completes the afternoon's participatory pleasures. Bring your loudest heckling voice and exercise your first-amendment rights. Held in Washington Square Park across the street from the Newberry Library.
ABOUT THE NEWBERRY LIBRARY
The Newberry Library is an independent library open to the public for research and reference in the humanities. One of the largest independent research libraries in the United States, the Newberry holds an extraordinary collection of more than 1.5 million books, 5 million manuscript pages and 300 thousand historic maps. As one of the world's leading repositories of a broad range of books and manuscripts relating to the civilizations of western Europe and the Americas, the Library's mission is to acquire and preserve research collections of such materials, and to provide for and promote their effective use by a diverse community of users.