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Posted by: Kristi Finefield
In the course of searching for a specific photograph of President Woodrow Wilson for a reference question, I came across the image below, and couldn’t resist it! Between the heart-shaped frames, the huge grins on both the President and the First Lady, and the addition of a cupid holding up two hearts perched in the …
Posted in: Photographs
Posted by: Melissa Lindberg
The first time I browsed through the Prints and Photographs Reading Room Graphics File, I came across a reference copy of a striking triptych of Japanese woodblock prints depicting a crowd of spectators in Western dress observing a balloon ascension. When I looked the image up in the Prints & Photographs Online Catalog and saw digitized …
Posted in: Prints, Series: Caught Our Eyes
Posted by: Barbara Orbach Natanson
The following is the fourth in a series of guest posts by Micah Messenheimer, Assistant Curator of Photography, Prints and Photographs Division, that discuss the parallel development of two technologies in the 19th century: railroads and photography. A previous blog post examined Andrew J. Russell’s background as a photographer during the Civil War and his …
Posted in: Photographs
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
In the first entry in this occasional series, Profiling Portraits, we examined occupational portraits, a type of portrait designed to tell the viewer a specific fact about the sitter: their occupation. We will now look at another type of portrait, one which is very popular today, thanks to the advent of smartphones with cameras: self-portraits, …
Posted in: Drawings, Photographs, Portraits, Prints, Series: Profiling Portraits
Posted by: Barbara Orbach Natanson
The following is a guest post by Helena Zinkham, Chief, Prints & Photographs Division. It’s a remarkable achievement for any social media program to still be going strong after ten years. But the most important part of the Flickr Commons is the opportunity to talk about pictures without the barriers of time and place. A …
Posted in: Flickr, News & Events, Photographs
Posted by: Melissa Lindberg
The following is an interview with Kit Arrington, Digital Library Specialist in the Prints and Photographs Division, about a project to scan the entire Popular Graphic Arts collection, for which she served as project manager. About a month ago I had a conversation with Senior Cataloger Woody Woodis about his work on the same project. …
Posted in: Prints, Series: Behind the Scenes
Posted by: Barbara Orbach Natanson
I can never resist a demonstration that the subjects of photos sometimes undermine the efforts of even the most professional photographers. The original caption for this photograph emphasizes charity, but the expressions on the two young boys’ faces suggest that they were feeling anything but charitable towards the photographer. The photo is one of thousands …
Posted in: Photographs, Series: Caught Our Eyes