THE ENGLISH TRADITION IN NATURE PRINTING
Noted authority on the history of printing Roderick Cave will speak on "The
English Tradition in Nature Printing" at 4:15 pm on Friday, April 25, 2003
in the Stetson Hall Faculty Lounge at Williams College, Williamstown,
Massachusetts.
Making prints direct from leaves and flowers (or from fishes and animals)
has been practiced in many parts of the world over the centuries. The
technique was adapted by Benjamin Franklin to produce counterfeit-proof
banknotes, and in the 19th century enjoyed a heyday as a means of botanical
illustration. Roderick Cave's talk will concentrate on technical advances
which enabled these developments, particularly in the work of Alois Auer in
Vienna and Henry Bradbury in London. It will look also at the industrial
developments in printing lace and other objects in Birmingham, Nottingham,
and Sheffield, England, and the interplay between nature printing and early
photographic techniques; and it will review the contribution of the
20th-century London artist/printer Morris Cox, whose methods were different
from those popularized in the United States by the Nature Printing Society.
Roderick Cave is formerly Foundation Professor of Librarianship at Victoria
University of Wellington, New Zealand, and the former head of Information
Studies at Nanyang University of Singapore. He has also taught in Jamaica,
Trinidad, and Nigeria as well as in Great Britain and the United States.
Probably best known for his history _The Private Press_, first published in
1971, he has written widely on aspects of printing and book production. He
lives in Leicestershire, England.
"The English Tradition in Nature Printing" will be free and open to the
general public. It is co-sponsored by the Chapin Library of Rare Books at
Williams College and the Williams College Graduate Program in the History
of Art. A reception will follow in the Chapin Library on the second floor
of Stetson Hall, in conjunction with the spring exhibition "Reading
Material: The Incarnation of Ideas," on view through May 2, 2003. The
exhibition includes books by Morris Cox as well as Roderick Cave's _Chinese
Ceremonial Papers_, published in 2002.
Parking is available behind Stetson Hall, on Hopkins Hall Drive north of
Main Street on the Williams College Campus. For more information, phone the
Chapin Library at 413-597-2462 during library hours, fax 413-597-2929, or
e-mail chapin.library@williams.edu. RSVP not required.
Wayne G. Hammond
Assistant Librarian
Chapin Library
Williams College
http://www.williams.edu/resources/chapin