Artwork above by R.D. Burton
Authors of Mischief
Rosenbach Museum & Library, September 5-October 5, 2008
Free Library of Philadelphia, October 14-December 5, 2008
Exhibition Jurors:
Judith Guston, Curator, Rosenbach Museum & Library
Elysa Voshell, Philadelphia Center for the Book
Robert Wuilfe, Curator, Landmarks Contemporary Projects
From the press release:
From the Canterbury Tales to Ulysses, the Rosenbach Museum & Library’s collection is full of books that have been banned, challenged or censored. To mark Banned Books Week, an annual celebration of the freedom to read, the museum will present Authors of Mischief, in conjunction with Philadelphia Center for the Book. The juried exhibition features contemporary artist books on themes related to banned books, censorship and control.
Authors of Mischief features the work of R. D. Burton, Monica Kane, Amee J. Pollack and Laurie Spitz, Jude Robison, and Miriam Schaer. The exhibition will be on display at the Rosenbach from Tuesday, September 23 through Sunday, October 5 before moving to the Free Library of Philadelphia’s Central Branch where the exhibition will be on display from October 14th – December 5th.
On Friday, October 3 from 5:30 – 7:30 p.m., the Rosenbach invites visitors to an artists’ reception and a reading by friends of the museum and Philadelphia notables of banned and censored books from the Rosenbach’s collections – a selection of which are currently on display. This year's readers include: Siobhan Reardon (President and Director, Free Library of Philadelphia), Peter Stambler (Dean, Liberal Arts, University of the Arts), Nora Berger-Green (Theater Programs Producer, National Constitution Center), Bill Adair (Director, Heritage Philadelphia Program of the Pew Charitable Trusts), Jack Lynch (Associate Professor, Rutgers University), Marina Brownlee (Professor, Princeton University), Nathalie Anderson (Poet and Professor, Swarthmore College), and Tom Devaney (Writer, Senior Writing Fellow, University of Pennsylvania).
Banned books from the museum’s collections currently on display include work by famed author and illustrator Maurice Sendak – the subject of the museum’s major retrospective There’s a Mystery There: Sendak on Sendak – whose books remain some of the most censored in American history. Sendak’s acclaimed book In the Night Kitchen regularly appears on the American Library Association's list of "frequently challenged and banned books” for its dream-like tale of Mickey, a young boy who visits the fantastic world of the bakers' kitchen, floating from page to page, frequently naked throughout the story.
Other banned books on display include a volume of William Shakespeare’s King Lear -- which was itself banned from the English stage from 1788 to 1820 as the madness of King George III made the topic of insane rulers politically unwise; Bram Stoker’s Dracula – banned in Communist Romania; and Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet On the Western Front – which was burned by the Nazis for criticizing the German army. Additional banned books on display include James Joyce’s Ulysses, Juan de Zumarraga’s Doctrina Breva, Daniel Defoe’s The Fortunes & Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, A Romance, among others.
Click on images below to advance slideshow.
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Miriam Schaer
