Artist Linda Sholand Vander Weele

As part of the multi-part exhibition Text Support: A Library Exhibit About Paper, the Kohler Art Library is currently featuring the exhibit Handmade Paper with Wisconsin Roots. For almost 50 years, Wisconsin has been a remarkable leader in the field of book arts and has played a vital role in the resurgence of handmade paper. Curated by Lyn Korenic and Tracy Honn, this exhibit showcases artists’ books that contain handmade paper made by artists with Wisconsin roots. The artists include pioneers, teachers, students, and practitioners, all of whom have been inspired by the craft and artistic possibilities of paper. The artists utilized a variety of interesting ingredients to craft their pieces, including used clothing, donated UW—Madison hospital sheets, flax, cotton, linen, bird’s nests and iris leaves. Featured artists are Walter Hamady, Jim Escalante, Mary Hark, Joe Wilfer, among many other talented artists!

At a glance:

• What: Exhibit of artists’ books containing handmade paper made by artists with Wisconsin roots
• Where: Kohler Art Library
• When: April 15th – June 30th, 2013

Want more?

• Visit the other components of the exhibition, History of Handmade and Commercial Paper and Wisconsin-related Industry, Department of Special Collections (976 Memorial Library) and Paper Engineering, Silver Buckle Press (2^nd floor, Memorial Library)
• Join co-curators Tracy Honn and Lyn Korenic for a gallery talk in the Department of Special Collections on Thursday, May 30^th from 3:00-4:00pm.

Victor Gorodinsky with his beloved cat, Asya

Our staff spotlight this month is Victor Gorodinsky, Memorial Library’s Slavic Languages Cataloger. Although his work keeps him very busy, Victor participates in a diverse array of unique activities and hobbies. Read on to learn more about Victor and the many roles he plays within and outside of the library.

News: Let’s start with the University of Wisconsin Russian Folk Orchestra, since you just recently had a concert. Can you speak a little about your involvement with founding and conducting the group?

VG: I am a professional musician—I was born in Russia and got my Master’s Degree in Music there. When I moved to the United States in 1982, I first settled in Chicago where I lived for three years. I was happily surprised to discover that there was a Russian Folk Orchestra at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I certainly did not expect to find something like that in the United States, but it was there! So I started traveling to Champaign to perform with the orchestra, which was founded and directed by one of the music professors at the University. In 1985 I moved to Champaign to be closer to the orchestra and ended up becoming sort of the “unofficial assistant conductor,” until the current conductor retired and I took his place. We did concerts and traveled a bit—it was fun. And that is how my “library life” began: I received my MLS there and worked as the Slavic Languages Cataloger at the University for ten years.

In 1995, I followed the job market to Madison where I was hired as the Slavic Languages Cataloger here at Memorial Library. I had this ambitious idea to start a Russian ensemble here but had to kind of settle in first and learn the music scene in Madison, which is incredibly rich! About a year later, I started talking with CREECA (Center for Russia, East Europe, and Central Asia at UW—Madison); I introduced my idea and although I had no experience whatsoever with starting a group from scratch and didn’t know much about finding money for such an endeavor, somehow the plan began taking shape.

The first thing was to find instruments. Russian instruments, such as balalaikas and domras aren’t like guitars or pianos that you can simply purchase at the local music store. I luckily had some connections for obtaining the instruments and with CREECA’s help was able to get a grant to purchase them. Once we got the instruments, we of course needed to find players. We distributed flyers around campus and about eight people showed up (better than nothing!). I brought a boom box and a few instruments so I could introduce the musicians to them, and most seemed genuinely interested. So now we needed a place to rehearse. The Slavic Department offered their conference room at 1418 Van Hise for practice after hours, and we’ve been rehearsing there ever since. During the first rehearsal, I had to basically teach the musicians how to play their instruments. I’m not an expert on all the instruments, but was able to instruct them somewhat. The musicians were very talented and some of them were able to pick it up very quickly.

In 1997 we had our first public performance, which was very short with a “whopping” repertoire of about five pieces and only eight people making up the “orchestra” (it was more of an ensemble at that point). But we did it, and it seemed to get a good reception. Sometimes I look back and can’t believe I actually pulled it off! The orchestra grew each year and is now at 37 members, four of whom are original members. The orchestra is mostly made up of students, but we are not exclusive to UW—anyone is welcome! Madison residents and retired UW professors are also among the players. We have some truly dedicated members; one of them travels from Milwaukee for rehearsals every Tuesday. We just released our fourth CD and are doing another recording session this Saturday (May 11). In the past, we used to only record live performances but we are now recording in a professional studio, which is a great accomplishment.

Victor and the Russian Folk Orchestra

The Russian Folk Orchestra takes up a lot of my time and energy. It’s become a really big part of my life. I don’t just direct; I do almost everything. I arrange the music and organize the concerts. Last summer, we did a big Russian music festival, and I got a lot of help from my orchestra members, but with them being primarily students, they are very busy so I end up doing most of the day-to-day work on my own. In June we are traveling to Stratford, WI to perform at their annual festival, and we have concerts booked already for next fall. We were also recently invited to play in Germany! The only thing standing in our way is the funds. Hopefully someday we’ll be able to go there. I love traveling with this group. The farthest we’ve traveled together is Minneapolis, which was a lot of fun. So to be able to fly to Germany together would be fantastic! We have an incredible group… It’s like a family. We love each other, have parties during the year, and we share lots of laughs.

News: Can you tell me a little bit about the work you do as a Slavic Languages Librarian?

VG: I do a lot… My official title when I started here in 1995 was Slavic, Eastern European, and Central Asian languages Cataloger; among other things, I’m a language specialist. But over the years, my duties have expanded. Cataloging is my primary thing but I also perform other duties related to cataloging and technical services. The adoption of RDA has generated a lot of work that has to do with converting pre-RDA records to the new format. You would not believe how busy we are right now! I love doing this, though. We strive to keep our database perfectly clean and up-to-date, and I’m very proud of it, but it is exhausting. At the end of the day I’m dead—not physically, of course, but… brain dead! When I get home, I collapse onto my couch, to the delight of my cat; she loves cuddling with me (and vice versa). The work is never done. I love doing it—it’s fascinating work, but it is brain-tiring.

News: What is your favorite part of your job?

VG: Cataloging is all about organizing materials in a way that makes them accessible to the people who need the information. It’s funny because I’m not the most organized person (if you see my living room you’ll know what I’m talking about), but I really enjoy the work. It’s what I love. Although computers have become an integral part of all our lives and I use them every day, I still get excited about using them. I just really enjoy working with computers—organizing the materials, making sure people can find what they’re looking for… Not just the people like me, but those who probably couldn’t care less about the cataloging side of it, who just need the materials! I’ve been doing it for such a long time and I still love it.

I also love working for the University. My first job in this country was in a business in downtown Chicago, and I have learned to appreciate the benefits of working in an academic environment. Plus, UW really is a first class University!

News: It’s hard to believe with the work you do at the library and with the orchestra that you have time for hobbies, but I hear you are quite the magician!

VG: Yes, magic has been a big part of my life since I was probably five. I don’t have the time for it much lately, but I have done a few small shows for the library in the past for Halloween and things like that. At this point I’m kind of a “passive magician.” Once or twice a year, I go to International Magic Conventions. I might go to one in Michigan this year. I have a lot of magic at home that I get from these conventions, but just don’t have time to do it much lately. I’m not a professional magician by any means, but it has always been a big hobby for me. Most people think of magic as a form of entertainment, which it is, but it is also a very ancient art. Magic is mentioned in Egyptian papyruses from way back before Christ. I know a lot about the history of magic, and have attended lectures at magic conventions discussing magic history and theory, which is fascinating. I also love to watch magic being performed—magicians usually don’t like the word “tricks”. I consider it to be a very unique and beautiful art. It’s a different art, not like painting or music or sculpture, of course, but it is still an art. It requires a lot of practice, so I don’t have much time for it now, but I guess you could say I’m the resident magician at Memorial Library. I have this sign in my office in CTS that says “Magician’s parking only—all others will disappear.”

Another passion of mine is traveling. I have been all over the United States, Canada, and Europe, and even Japan and Kazakhstan. My most favorite place? Probably Montréal, Québec; I have been madly in love with that city for years! Since I moved to the U.S. I’ve only ever lived in the Midwest, so it is nice to be able to travel and see other parts of the States as well. Sometimes I think it would be nice to live on the coast—California or Oregon, or the New England area. It is beautiful out there. But I truly love Madison. It’s a great city, there’s always something going on—I love the farmer’s market… It’s been seventeen years and I still discover new neighborhoods, new restaurants. So I am grateful to fate for putting me here.

News: So between the orchestra, your work at the library, your hobby as a magician, and traveling… I don’t suppose you still have time for reading, do you?

VG: I do somehow manage to make time for reading still, although these days I read less, but I watch a lot of movies; over the years I have become a real movie-buff. I read and speak several languages, but when I read for pleasure I mostly enjoy reading in Russian, particularly the well-established classics.

As for movies, I usually stick to serious movies, often foreign. I subscribe to Netflix and I probably watch two to three films a week. I haven’t been out to the movie theater in probably seven or eight years, though. I prefer to watch them at home because I can cuddle up with my cat and also I don’t have to deal with the guy next to me laughing loudly during the most inappropriate moments, it happens all the time! Oh, and I hate the smell of popcorn!

Want more?

• Visit the University of Wisconsin Russian Folk Orchestra website
• Listen to some sample clips of the orchestra or download their latest CD, Candlelight 
• Check out this sneak peek from the May 11th recording session
• Take a look at this video of the magician in action!

Know a librarian or library staff member with a cool skill or interest? They belong in the spotlight! Submit your suggestions to news@library.wisc.edu.  We’d love to learn more about you!

One title included in Steenbock Library’s Seed Saving collection

Librarians at Steenbock Memorial Library are participating in this year’s UW Family Gardening Day on May 11 on the UW-Madison campus.  The annual showcase of gardening ideas runs from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. at the university’s D.C. Smith Instructional Greenhouses and Allen Centennial Gardens.

Steenbock Library, which is located between the two gardens, invites visitors to explore the library’s extensive gardening collections.

Librarian Karen Dunn outlined some of the exciting ways Steenbock will participate in this event: “In addition to staffing a library information table highlighting library access, gardening collections, and Cooperative Extension publications,” she says, “we will also have a book display and  play host to an information table staffed by Master Gardener volunteers.”

The social media crew at Steenbock also pulled together a series of Pinterest boards to show off the broad range of gardening-related collections at the library, from seed-saving resources to books on therapy gardens.

You can check out the boards at the UWMadLibraries Pinterest account, or click on the links below:

Seed Saving | Enabling Gardens | Community Gardens

Directions & Parking: The D.C. Smith Greenhouse is located at 465 Babcock Dr., across the street from Babcock Hall. Allen Centennial Gardens is a block north at 620 Babcock Dr. Free parking is available in Lot 40 behind Babcock Hall and in Lot 36 just west of Steenbock Library.

More events: Check out the lineup for all of the UW-Gardening Day events HERE.

In his books, Shawn Sheehy’s images of plants, animals, and even landscapes literally move. Sheehy made his first pop-up book as a design student at Madison Area Technical College, and for the past fifteen years, he has developed a series of pop-up books that bring attention to ecosystems, resource allocation, and species adaptability.

His talk, Concept to (Political) Action: Pop-Up Artists’ Books, will be held on Tuesday, May 14, noon–1:30 p.m. in 126 Memorial Library on the UW-Madison campus. Sheehy’s lecture will include many images from his books and the stories that inspire him.

At a glance:

• What: Concept to (Political) Action: Pop-Up Artists’ Books, an Artist Talk with Shawn Sheehy
• When: Tuesday, May 14, 12:00–1:30 pm
• Where: 126 Memorial Library, 728 State Street

Book artist Shawn Sheehy

This lecture is sponsored by the Friends of the Libraries and is part of Text Support: A Library Exhibit About Paper. Text Support is a multi-library exhibit on the history and artistry of paper, and is co-curated by Tracy Honn of Silver Buckle Press and Lyn Korenic of the Kohler Art Library.  The exhibit will run from April 15 through June 2013, and includes display cases at the Kohler Art Library and at Silver Buckle Press and the Department of Special Collections in Memorial Library.

All exhibitions and events, including Sheehy’s Artist Talk, are free and open to the public.

Questions? For more information about the lecture and exhibits visit the Friends’ website, e-mail  friends@library.wisc.edu, or call 608-265-2505.

“The Lawyer Who Died in the Courthouse Bathroom,” a chapbook by Thomas J. Erickson.

Parallel Press is pleased to announce the publication of The Lawyer Who Died in the Courthouse Bathroom, a new collection of poetry by Thomas J. Erickson ($10.00, Parallel Press, 2013).

In The Lawyer Who Died in the Courthouse Bathroom, Erickson’s muscular poems perform a post-mortem on the titular lawyer with unflinching honesty, digging into personal life failures, the noble work defending indigent clients, and the ugly compromises made in order to do so.

The result is a complete and complicated portrait of the human condition, one that circles back on itself to the title poem and demands re-reading. “The Lawyer Who Died in the Courthouse Bathroom,” reads as both obituary and elegy, at once acknowledging the futility and necessity of a life’s work: ‘As a young man, he read Camus and resolved / that if God did exist it wouldn’t make any difference… The hundreds of people he represented; / their dramas not worth one whit. / The files waiting in his briefcase / the combination set to open.”

Thomas J. Erickson was born in 1960 and grew up in Kohler, Wisconsin.  He received a BA from Beloit College in English Composition and a law degree from Marquette University.  His poems have appeared in numerous publications including The Los Angeles Review, Quiddity International Literary Review, Mad Poet’s Review, The New Poet, and Slant.  He is an attorney in Milwaukee where he is a member of the Hartford Avenue Poets.  He is the proud father of Charles and John

How to order

The Lawyer Who Died in the Courthouse Bathroom  is available for purchase through Parallel Press for $10.00. Discounts are provided for libraries, booksellers, and non-profit organizations.

Questions? Contact Parallel Press: 608-262-1433 or parallelpress@library.wisc.edu

In a tight race against Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, LOTR claimed the UW-Madison Libraries 2013 Book Madness tournament title on April 10th.  LOTR won with 51.7% of the votes– here’s how the final match-up went down:

• The Lord of the Rings: 451 votes, 51.7%
• Pride and Prejudice: 421 votes, 48.3%

The new posters, seen at right, show Bucky reading his copy of The Lord of the Rings at the terrace.  The posters are 9×12,” a perfect size for lockers, bulletin boards, or dorm room walls.

E-mail bucky@library.wisc.edu if you’re interested in ordering these special-edition Book Madness Bucky READ posters.

Special thanks go to Senior Artist Dan Joe for creating the new design.

Barb Richards at her retirement party on April 23rd

On Tuesday, April 23^rd, a retirement party was held in honor of Barb Richards of the Special Collections Department at Memorial Library. Barb’s last day is today, Thursday, April 25^th.

As Barb has noted, with customary good cheer, her work on campus has gone “from rats to rabies to rare books.” She began working at the Gnotobiotic Laboratory at UW-Madison from 1974 to 1977, and after a short stint working in the rabies lab at the Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene (WSLH) on campus she came to the Department of Rare Books (now Special Collections) in December 1977.

Barb has helped the Department grow from its original location (the space now occupied by the Microform/Media Center) to its current home on the top two floors of Memorial Library, and she knows every nook and cranny in the Department. She has trained and supervised generations of students in Special Collections, many of whom still stay in touch with her. Working closely with selectors Christine Rom, Gretchen Lagana, Yvonne Schofer, and now Susan Barribeau, Barb has managed the renowned collection of “Little Magazines,” keeping track of publications that defy normal serials practices, following their frequent address and title changes, and cajoling their editors and publishers to fill in gaps. The result is a large and wide-ranging collection that attracts students and faculty from campus as well as scholars from afar, and accounts for much document delivery to researchers elsewhere. Barb has also managed major moves of all of the Department’s holdings with great efficiency, most recently during the installation of compact shelving in the vaults.

Barb’s retirement plans include travel, home projects, and spending time with a new grandchild.

Cards for Barb and envelopes for contributions toward a retirement gift are available in both the GLS administrative office and at the reference desk in Special Collections. Best wishes to Barb as she begins her new adventure!

This spring, UW-Madison Libraries plays host an exciting exhibit and event series focusing on the history and artistry of paper. Text Support: A Library Exhibit About Paper is a multi-library exhibit co-curated by Tracy Honn of Silver Buckle Press and Lyn Korenic of the Kohler Art Library.  The exhibit runs from April 15 through June 2013, and includes display cases at the Kohler Art Library and at Silver Buckle Press and the Department of Special Collections in Memorial Library.

Professor Timothy Barrett

The Friends of the Libraries are sponsoring a series of related lectures, artist talks, and workshops, starting with the Annual Schewe Lecture on Wednesday April 24th. Professor Timothy Barrett, MacArthur Fellow and Director of the University of Iowa Center for the Book, will speak to the future of printing and paper in the digital age.

This event will include an exhibit viewing in Special Collections  from 5:00-6:00pm, followed by Dr. Barrett’s lecture and a reception.

Annual Schewe Lecture featuring Professor Timothy Barrett, MacArthur Fellow and Director of the University of Iowa Center for the Book

• When: Wednesday, April 24, 2013 5:00–7:00 p.m.
• Where: 976 Special Collections, Memorial Library, 728 State Street

Description: The digital age has ushered in the decline of some paper publications and the rise of new electronic formats. As digital devices become increasingly user-friendly and cheap, what will become of printing and paper? Join paper specialist Tim Barrett as he speaks to these topics. Join us before the lecture to view the exhibit Text Support: A Library Exhibit About Paper in the Department of Special Collections.

This event is co-sponsored by the Libraries’ Department of Special Collections, the Silver Buckle Press, and the Kohler Art Library. The event is free and open to the public.

Featured materials include a selection of handmade books from the Kohler Art Library’s Artist Book Collection that incorporate poetry as the main text of the work.  These books explore landscape, changing seasons, and other themes with words and images, and are beautifully constructed and illustrated with prints, paintings, and folded paper “quilts.”

Another treasure on display for National Poetry month is a rare edition of Willa Cather’s April Twilights, on loan from Special Collections.  April Twilights is a beautiful first edition, and is rare because author disliked the publication and tried to buy up all the copies before her career as a novelist bloomed.

In addition to these treasures, the display also showcases new poetry printed by Parallel Press and the University of Wisconsin Press, including the 2013 winners of the Brittingham, Pollak, and Four Lakes poetry prizes.  All volumes are accompanied by example poems.

Special thanks to librarians Lyn Korenic and Susan Barribeau for their help in selecting materials for the display, and to designer Dan Joe for creating the display backdrops.