Robert Cornelius, a Philadelphia photographer, is believed to have taken the world's first self-portrait -- the first selfie -- in 1839. The Library, which already had the world's large collection of his work, in December acquired a donation from Cornelius’ great-great-grand-daughter, Sarah Bodine, of more of his photographic materials. Preservationists are now at work on the new donation.
"Not an Ostrich: And Other Images from America's Library," an exhibit featuring more than 400 photographs from the Library's collections, is now open in the Jefferson Building and can be viewed online. It debuted in 2018 at the Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles. The show is a visual journey through American culture and history.
For years, artist Robert Schultz has made creative reuse of historical Civil War-era images, developing photographs from the Library's Liljenquist Family Collection of Civil War Portraits in the flesh of tree and plant leaves found on former battlefields. It turned out so well that the Library has acquired some of his art.
I.M. Pei died Thursday at his home in Manhattan. He was 102. In recognition of his extraordinary achievements, we reprint this guest post by Mari Nakahara, curator of architecture, design and engineering in the Prints and Photographs Division, focusing on his items in the Library. It ran on his 100th birthday. Chinese-American architect Ieoh Ming …
In fall 2005, Joe Manning agreed to help his friend, author Elizabeth Winthrop, with a task that had become something of an obsession for her: discovering the story of a little girl staring intently out of a 1910 picture taken at a Vermont cotton mill. Winthrop had encountered the image in an exhibition of child-labor …
This month, we’re highlighting selections from the Library’s vast international poster collection on our Free to Use and Reuse page – and an animation contest. The posters we’re showcasing – on themes from travel, sports and entertainment to consumer goods and more – reflect a special collaboration between the Library and Poster House, a new …
A little more than a year ago, Hurricane Harvey hit the Texas coast as a category 4 storm, bringing damaging rain and flooding. Less than a month later, Hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico with heavy downpours and sustained winds of 155 miles an hour – only two miles an hour shy of a category 5 …
This is a guest post by Ryan Reft, a historian in the Manuscript Division. In recognition of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, he explores the role of baseball in the nation’s Japanese-American community. For more about baseball, check out our blog series counting down the weeks until the June 29 opening of “Baseball Americana,” a …
