The Prints & Photographs Division offers regular webinars on specific topics from the collections. Topics of past webinars are as diverse as the collections themselves. These virtual presentations introduce the Prints & Photographs Division collections, services and search tools, and feature staff taking a closer look at an object or group of objects from the collections – a chance to converse and appreciate together!
Webinars
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Film, VideoOn the Road: Travel Ephemera in the Margolies Collection Curator of Architecture Mari Nakahara leads a tour of a remarkable collection that spans the late 19th century to the early 2000s. Driving through the United States from the 1960s to the early 2000s to document roadside America, architectural historian John Margolies amassed an amazing collection of postcards, travel brochures and road maps. While his colorful photographs have become well known through books and…- Contributor: Nakahara, Mari
- Date: 2024-08-21
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Film, VideoFinding Pictures for Pride Month The Library's prints and photographs collections contain a rich resource of visual materials depicting LGBTQ+ communities, lives and issues. In celebration of Pride Month, join photography and graphic art curators Micah Messenheimer and Katherine Blood as they take a look at these collections with a particular focus on photographs, artist's prints and posters by historic and contemporary queer creators. Image credit: Trevor Messersmith- Contributor: Messenheimer, Micah - Blood, Katherine
- Date: 2024-06-26
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Film, VideoHow to Identify Daguerreotype, Ambrotype and Tintype Photos Do you have a box of 19th-century family photos stored in plastic or leather cases you've always wanted to know more about? Have you scoured estate sales and been intrigued by small portraits on glass and metal and wondered how they were made? Would you like to know how to best store and preserve your antique photography collection for years to come? Join Library…- Contributor: Smiley, Michelle - Wetzel, Rachel
- Date: 2024-04-17
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Film, VideoEliza Scidmore, Trailblazing Journalist In celebration of Women's History Month, join author Diana P. Parsell as she discusses her recent book "Eliza Scidmore: The Trailblazing Journalist Behind Washington's Cherry Trees" with Library specialists Elizabeth A. Novara and Mari Nakahara.- Contributor: Parsell, Diana P. - Nakahara, Mari - Novara, Elizabeth
- Date: 2024-03-05
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Film, VideoHighlights from the Robert H. McNeill Family Collection Archivist Leah Rios and photography curator Kate Fogle highlight the career of African American photographer Robert H. McNeill (1917-2005), who documented 20th-century African American leadership and life in Washington D.C from the 1930s-1970s. They will explore the newly processed Robert H. McNeill Family Collection and will touch on McNeill's family photographs and albums, local portraiture and photojournalism from operating his freelance news service in…- Contributor: Fogle, Kate - Rios, Leah
- Date: 2024-02-21
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Film, VideoRalph Ellison: Photographer This webinar celebrates Ralph Ellison's creativity and observation of African American life through discussion of Michal Raz-Russo and John F. Callahan's collaboratively created book "Ralph Ellison: Photographer." The book uses select photographs and historical documents from Ellison collections at the Library of Congress to explore Ellison (1913-1994) as a personal and professional freelance photographer, revealing an artistic side of Ellison that is not widely…- Contributor: Callahan, John F. - Raz-Russo, Michal
- Date: 2024-02-08
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Film, VideoSubject Indexing for Pictures: The Thesaurus for Graphic Materials Antoinette O'Bryant and Libby McKiernan discuss subject indexing using the Library Congress Thesaurus for Graphic Materials. You will learn how to describe images using topical index terms, how these terms can help you search for pictures in the Library's online catalog and ways you can use the Thesaurus for personal or work collections. You will also have an opportunity to index some images from…- Contributor: O'Bryant, Antoinette - McKiernan, Libby
- Date: 2024-01-17
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Film, VideoCartoon Cavalcade The Library of Congress has amassed a collection of 140,000 cartoon prints and drawings over the past 150 years, including political cartoons, comic strip and comic book illustrations, gag cartoons and animation cels. Join Sara W. Duke, the Library's curator of popular and applied graphic art, for an insider's perspective of the wealth of cartoon art in the collections of the Library. While the…- Contributor: Duke, Sara W.
- Date: 2023-12-20
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Film, VideoCelebrating 90 Years of the Historic American Buildings Survey The Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS, est. 1933) is the nation's first federal preservation program to document America's architectural heritage. This effort, later joined by the Historic American Engineering Record (HAER, est. 1969) and the Historic American Landscapes Survey (HALS, est. 2000), is administered through the National Park Service. The series in combination have recorded America's built environment in multiformat surveys comprising drawings, photographs…- Contributor: Brubacher, Ryan - Lavoie, Catherine
- Date: 2023-11-15
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Film, VideoPresidential Pets Dogs, cats, horses, cows -- as well as far more unusual animals -- have called the White House and its grounds home over the last two centuries. Watch a visual tour of the menagerie of animals that have been Presidential Pets, with images selected from the collections of the Prints and Photographs Division.- Contributor: Finefield, Kristi
- Date: 2023-10-18
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Film, VideoIllustrating Civil War Medicine From the visible wounds inflicted by the newly-developed mini ball to the invisible spread of disease, the American Civil War's effects on combatants, their loved ones, and those charged with their care, were both visible and invisible. This webinar explains how photographers, printmakers, and eye-witness sketch artists picture the vast and complicated arena of medical care during the deadliest military conflict in U.S. history.- Contributor: Eaker, Jon - Smiley, Michelle
- Date: 2023-09-20
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Film, VideoI Want You to Learn About the Library's Poster Collection Watch an overview of the poster holdings in the Prints & Photographs Division of the Library of Congress. See collection highlights and learn how to use the collection in-person and online.- Contributor: Grenci, Jen
- Date: 2023-07-19
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Film, VideoLooking Closely: Visual Literacy with Prints and Photographs What do you see? Deepening what we can learn from visual materials is as easy as asking simple questions. Drawing on examples from photography to architectural drawings, Prints & Photographs Division staff will lead attendees through exercises in close looking - audience participation is encouraged! Explore how taking a good look can help even non-experts learn more about images for work, school and play.- Contributor: Brubacher, Ryan - Mahoney, Gillian
- Date: 2023-06-21
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Film, VideoSeeing in 3D: Stereographs at the Library of Congress Photography curators Micah Messenheimer and Michelle Smiley present a three-dimensional view into the Prints & Photographs collections.- Contributor: Messenheimer, Micah - Smiley, Michelle
- Date: 2023-05-17
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Film, VideoFinding Pictures for National Arab American Heritage Month Celebrate National Arab American Heritage Month with a selection of pictures by and about the diverse Arab American community. Curator Sara W. Duke explores photographs, cartoons, and drawings that depict famous people, social life, traditions, and immersion into Arab American culture.- Contributor: Duke, Sara
- Date: 2023-04-19
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Film, VideoGoing to Bat for Library Collections Baseball history can be found in many divisions at the Library of Congress, but this online orientation will focus on finding visual materials specifically in Prints & Photographs. Featuring amateur, recreational, professional, and even congressional baseball, this video will include searching tools and discuss collections teaming with baseball visuals.- Contributor: Soltys, Hanna
- Date: 2023-03-29
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Film, VideoLens on American History: Japanese American World War II Incarceration Watch an overview of notable collections in the Library's prints and photographs collections, giving special attention to connections we have made to identify people in the photos and provide more context on their experiences. President Franklin Roosevelt's February 19, 1942 Executive Order 9066 resulted in the incarceration of more than 120,000 Japanese Americans living on the West Coast. The Library's collections are rich in…- Contributor: Messenheimer, Micah - Chittenden, Kara
- Date: 2023-02-15
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Film, VideoHappy 100th Birthday, Victor A. Lundy In this virtual presentation, Donna Kacmar, FAIA, professor at the University of Houston, and editor of "Victor Lundy: Artist Architect", will share highlights from the collection in a discussion of Lundy's "awareness of materiality and structural form, and his ability to design with light and evoke the spirit of the time."- Contributor: Nakahara, Mari - Kacmar, Donna - Duke, Sara
- Date: 2023-01-18
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Film, VideoOur Digital Collections: Each Image Has Its Own Path Each digital image in the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division has its own origin story and workflow to becoming available on the Library of Congress website. What defines an image as born digital and how do we approach digitizing negatives? Digital Library Specialist Taren Ouellette will guide you through the highlights of these activities from the Farm Security Administration and Carol M.…- Contributor: Ouellette, Taren - Mahoney, Gillian
- Date: 2022-12-21
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Film, VideoRobert Blackburn's Early Color Lithographs Robert Blackburn (1920-2003) was a MacArthur Award-winning artist, master printer and teacher who changed the course of American art through his innovative graphic work. His legendary Printmaking Workshop studio became a mecca for talented artists from around the country and world; their artworks attest to Blackburn's enduring vision and are now a part of the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop collection at the Library of…- Contributor: Blood, Katherine - Nosek, Basia
- Date: 2022-11-16
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Film, VideoThe 125th Anniversary of the Thomas Jefferson Building In this video we celebrate the 125th anniversary of the opening of the Thomas Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress. We explore the 1897 building through a selection of nearly 1,000 newly-digitized architectural drawings dating from the Jefferson Building's design and construction as well as related photos and other visual materials.- Contributor: Finefield, Kristi
- Date: 2022-11-03
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Film, VideoLatino Graphic Art and Artists Watch a visual exploration of dynamic contemporary artist prints, posters, and drawings from the Library's collections. Hispanic Reading Room reference librarian Maria Daniela Thurber and Prints & Photographs Division curator Katherine Blood will feature the newly-digitized and catalogued Mission Gráfica/La Raza Graphics collection and artist prints and posters from such collectives as Dignidad Rebelde and Self Help Graphics.- Contributor: Thurber, Maria Daniela - Blood, Katherine
- Date: 2022-08-17
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Film, VideoImperial Projections: Witnessing the War of 1898 in American Visual Culture Swann Fellow Ramey Mize describes her research into the ways that technologies of violence, vision, and image-making intersected with the Battles of Santiago and San Juan Hill in the War of 1898. Firsthand sketches by William Glackens reflect a dissonance between the eyewitness claims of artists and the calculated erasure of Cuba's Liberation Army. Sent to the Cuban front by McClure's Magazine, Glackens chronicled…- Contributor: Duke, Sara - Mize, Ramey
- Date: 2022-08-15
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Film, VideoLandscapes Through the Lens of Laura Gilpin In this Object Lesson, join Curator Micah Messenheimer to explore how Gilpin both drew on and broke from tradition to present a deeply human landscape through the lens of her camera. Among the foremost American photographers of the 20th century, Laura Gilpin made landscapes that varied from evocative, fog-shrouded views of Garden of the Gods in her hometown of Colorado Springs to sharp and…- Contributor: Messenheimer, Micah
- Date: 2022-08-04
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Film, VideoAnarchism and Visual Culture in Greater Mexico Anarchism and Visual Culture in Greater Mexico is a presentation by Rosalía Romero, a Chau Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Art History at Pomona College and a 2020 Swann Fellow awardee at the Library of Congress. Her talk examines the role anarchism played in debates about the aesthetics of modern art in Mexico. The Swann Foundation Fellowship, administered by the Library since…- Contributor: Romero, Rosalía
- Date: 2022-07-18