Following an event and book display organised by Jean Khalfa at Trinity College Wren Library on 15 October 2018, Cambridge University Library recently received a donation of about 40 artists’ books published in Nice by La Diane française between 2004 and 2018.
Inside the new Library Storage Facility
The Library Storage Facility (LSF), whose contents can be ordered to the Library but cannot be borrowed, was opened in June 2018. By the end of 2019, the store’s astonishing 4,000,000-book capacity will be one third full. We in Collections and Academic Liaison have started sending a few books there, and this blog post looks at the what, the why, and the how.
In the past few years, the University Library has been very fortunate in receiving the private libraries of two late British Ukrainians – Peter Yakimiuk and Teodor Kolassa. Together, these donations have added hundreds of chiefly diaspora publications to the Library’s 20th-century Ukrainian collection. This blog post celebrates a few of the many eye-catching book covers to be found amongst them. All but the last of the six items detailed here were produced in Europe within a few years of the end of World War 2. Please click on each image to see a larger version.
Professor Nicoletta Misler and Professor John Bowlt in the University Librarian’s offices.
Professor John Bowlt, a highly distinguished art historian of late Imperial and early Soviet visual culture, and the 2015-16 Cambridge Slade Professor of Fine Art, has announced that he will donate his library to the University Library as the Bowlt-Misler Collection. This is an extremely exciting development. Professor Bowlt has built his library into an astounding resource over the course of his career, and it now numbers many thousands of books, periodicals and catalogues.
Last month, the CamCREES Revolution lecture series audience enjoyed a beautifully illustrated talk on Soviet porcelain. Petr Aven spoke about the development of porcelain work in the Soviet Union, with examples from his own superlative collection. This blog post looks at the collection’s staggering 3-volume catalogue, generously presented by Mr Aven to the University Library after his talk. The subject of porcelain as a medium for Soviet propaganda is fascinating, and the catalogue is an exquisite and important addition to the Library on the topic.
