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Posted by: Kristi Finefield
Today we take to the air with photographer Carol M. Highsmith and journey up and down the Eastern seaboard. Over the last year, photos of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia have come to the Library of Congress to be added to the ever-growing Carol M. Highsmith Archive. Highsmith’s …
Posted in: Photographs
Posted by: Melissa Lindberg
It’s that time of year when many of us are getting ready to head to the airport and hop on a plane en route to family and friends for the holidays. Air travel, like many modern conveniences, is a perk easy to take for granted despite its relatively short history. A visual trip through the …
Posted in: Photographs, Posters
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
The following is a guest post by Katherine Blood, Curator of Fine Prints, Prints & Photographs Division. Among the Library’s treasures is a special collection of Italian chiaroscuro woodcuts made during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries by such master artists as Domenico Beccafumi, Ugo da Carpi, Bartolomeo Coriolano, and Niccolò Vicentino. Although the chiaroscuro technique …
Posted in: Prints, Researcher Stories
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
If you are a regular reader of the Double Take series, you’ll know that I often come across photos that pique my curiosity while in the course of looking for something else. Today’s entry started much the same way. Within a search for images of Abraham Lincoln, I hit upon an unexpected photo. The caption …
Posted in: Photographs, Series: Double Take, Visual literacy
Posted by: Barbara Orbach Natanson
In the era before the development of social media, how did you get a big message across? Type it out on a giant typewriter! Reference Librarian Jon Eaker ran across this photo while browsing the Harris & Ewing negatives online. It came with very little information. As with many images that catch our eyes, however, …
Posted in: Photographs, Series: Caught Our Eyes
Posted by: Barbara Orbach Natanson
The following is a guest post by Hanna Soltys, who arrived at the Library of Congress in June 2018 as a Librarian in Residence, making wonderful contributions and observations while working as a reference librarian in the Prints & Photographs Division. When getting acclimated to a new place, you’re encouraged to “get lost.” I pleasantly …
Posted in: Photographs, Women's History
Posted by: Melissa Lindberg
Library of Congress staff members compile subject guides to help researchers get a better sense of the contents of the collections on a particular subject — and to find those resources. The Library of Congress recently launched the first batch of guides in a new format, utilizing the LibGuides platform, which we hope will make …
Posted in: Architecture, Photographs, Research Guides
Posted by: Barbara Orbach Natanson
The following is a guest post by Ben Zuercher, Liljenquist Family Fellow through the Stanford in Government program, Prints & Photographs Division, Summer 2018. Ben helped to describe recently received items in the Liljenquist Family Collection. Working with the Liljenquist collection carries the constant feeling of wonder and intrigue, as every picture tells a story …
Posted in: Photographs, Portraits
Posted by: Melissa Lindberg
Halloween provides an opportunity to meditate on — and perhaps to visit — some of the American landscape’s more mysterious tourist destinations. I recently grew curious about these peculiar attractions when I came across a photograph by roadside documentarian John Margolies of a sign for Saint Ignace, Michigan’s Mystery Spot. The Saint Ignace Mystery Spot promises visitors a disorienting sensory experience …
Posted in: Photographs