Untested Tranquilizer Back In Circulation At Yale Library

By Nancy Mattoon

"Monty," Yale Law Library's
Controversial Canine Tranquilizer.
(Image Courtesy of Lillian Goldman Law Library.)

A Booktryst story first reported in September 2010, concerning the illicit use of an untested tranquilizer at the Yale Law School Library, has taken a new turn. Once again, the scoop on the continuing controversy involving the Lillian Goldman Law Library comes from the online legal tabloid, Above The Law. Last year, the tabloid revealed staffers at the library were circulating a stress-reliever with the street name "Monty" to calm the frayed nerves of the school's would-be legal eagles. Once this irresponsible experiment came to light, the controversial substance was suddenly "withdrawn," and Goldman librarian Julian Aiken denied the entire episode, claiming: "I'm not quite sure where Above the Law got its information from, but we have not actually proceeded with circulating Monty."

Lillian Goldman Law Library's
Original Full Catalog Record For "Monty."
It Was Mysteriously Deleted In September, 2010.

But a March 10, 2011 internal memo obtained by Above The Law reveals that far from abandoning the study of the tranquilizer, technically known as, "Border Terrier Mix General Montgomery," the Yale staffers are now planning a controlled clinical trial of the substance, using volunteer students as guinea pigs. According to the Goldman Library memo: "The Law library intends to run a three-day pilot program starting on March 28, 2011 during which students will be able to “check out” our certified library therapy dog, Monty, for thirty minute periods. We hope that making a therapy dog available to our students will prove to be a positive addition to current services offered by the library."

Above The Law's Paparazzi Captured
This Candid Shot Of Monty in 2010.

It appears that this time around library staffers are determined to rigorously test their new treatment for the psychologically overwhelmed students of America's top-rated law school. Again quoting from the internal memo, "Beginning March 21, 2011, a sign-up sheet with additional information will be available at the circulation desk for students wishing to check out Monty. Even though Monty is hypoallergenic, visits will be confined to a dedicated non-public space in the library to eliminate potential adverse reactions from any library user who might have dog-related concerns. We are committed to ensuring our library remains a welcoming and comfortable environment for all our users. Finally, we will need your feedback and comments to help us decide if this will be a permanent on-going program available during stressful periods of the semester, for example during examinations."

Another 2010 Document From The Goldman Library,
Since Removed From The Catalog.

However, even with this new, much more tightly structured approach to introducing the still-experimental Monty to psychologically vulnerable scholars, official Yale sources remain tight-lipped regarding the stress reliever. "We can confirm that the Law Library is, in fact, doing this pilot program with Monty, the therapy dog, but beyond that, we have nothing to add," said Kathy Colello, the news director in the Office of Public Affairs. When contacted, Goldman library assistant Eugene Kozoloff maintained complete ignorance, stating he had seen “neither hide nor hair” of the dog. But recent law school alum Sohail Ramirez says he has already been introduced to Monty, and can verify that he is “definitely real and awesome.”

Yale's Original Mascot,
"Handsome Dan" The Bulldog,
Is Eerily Similar To Monty.

(Image Courtesy of the Yale University
Manuscripts & Archives Digital Images Database.)

Booktryst's independent research has revealed some facts that would seem to back-up the validity of the study, but also some decidedly cautionary information. Since Monty is a "mix," that means some of his genetic background remains a question mark. But according to Wikipedia, the Border Terrier breed's "love of people and even temperament make them fine therapy dogs, especially for children and the elderly, and they are occasionally used to aid the blind or deaf." On the other hand, student test subjects should have a care, Border Terriers were "originally bred as fox and vermin hunters...they will get along well with cats that they have been raised with, but may chase other cats and small animals such as mice, rabbits, squirrels, rats, and guinea pigs." (Emphasis mine.)

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Justice Is Blind--And Beautiful--At Yale Library

By Nancy Mattoon

Code Penal: commentaires imagés de Joseph Hémard.
Paris : Editions Littéraires de France, [192u?]
(All Images Courtesy of Lillian Goldman Law Library.)

The personification of Lady Justice as a goddess balancing the scales of truth and fairness dates back at least to Ancient Egypt and the Goddess Maat, as shown in the Egyptian Book of the Dead. Maat later morphed into the better known Isis, and was then co-opted by the Romans, who renamed her Justitia. But whatever name she is given, Lady Justice with her scales, and later her blindfold and sword, remains a beautiful and compelling figure in paintings, sculptures, and, of course, book illustrations. Yale Law School's Lillian Goldman Law Library specializes in collecting rare, illustrated law books, and has recently expanded an already fascinating online collection of images of Justitia in all her glory from it's massive collection of rare volumes.

Corvinus, Johannes Arnoldi.
Iurisprudentia Romana.
Amsterdam, 1644.

According to a February blog entry by rare book librarian Mike Widener, "This past month I've added 44 additional images containing depictions of Justitia (Lady Justice), to our Flickr gallery Justitia: Iconography of Justice...For the past several months I've been scouring our collection for such images, and also buying books containing images of Justitia, as part of our collecting focus on illustrated law books."

Calcografia dal vol. I di:
Dei delitti e delle pene edizione novissima...
Bassano: a spese Remondini di Venezia, 1797.

Widener also notes that the new images of Lady Justice are linked to the recent publication of a book by Yale Law professors Judith Resnik and Dennis E. Curtis, Representing Justice: Invention, Controversy, and Rights in City-states and Democratic Courtrooms (Yale University Press, 2011). Professors Resnik and Curtis are also conducting a seminar for Yale Law School in the Spring 2011 semester based on their book.

Diploma der allergnädigsten Privilegien so Ihro Königliche
Majestät zu Hungarn und Böheim,
Ertz-Hertzogin zu Oesterreich, &c. &c.
Maria Theresia, denen Botzner-Märckten ertheilet.
Botzen: Daselbst zu finden, 1744.

Goddess Justitia has also been the muse for the latest exhibition at the Lillian Goldman Law Library, Life and Law in Early Modern England. Co-sponsored by the Library and Yale's Elizabethan Club, the exhibition reflects the ways in which, "English law not only underwent deep changes in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, but also played a leading role in politics and culture." Life and Law in Early Modern England is part of the year-long Centenary celebration of Yale's Elizabethan Club, founded in 1911 as a meeting place for conversation and discussion of literature and the arts. The exhibit was curated by Justin Zaremby, a 2010 graduate of the Yale Law School, with assistance from Mike Widener.

Statutvm terrae Sancti Archangeli
duplici indice illustratum.
Ravennae: typis Io. Baptiste Patij, 1669.

In his introduction to the exhibit, Zaremby writes, "The occasion of the Club's Centenary provides the opportunity to bring together two impressive collections of early modern texts at Yale to illustrate a rich moment in English legal history." The books and manuscripts on display date from 1570 to the 1670s. They include guides to legal practice, textbooks, a play performed at an Inn of Court, and works dealing with church-state relations, legal philosophy, court jurisdiction, and the claim of Mary Queen of Scots to the English throne. Among the authors included are several of the era's leading figures, such as Francis Bacon, Francis Beaumont, Lord Burghley, Edward Coke, and John Selden.

Maximae juris celebriores,
deductae ex jure canonico, civili, glossa.
Tyrnaviae: Typis Academicis, S. Jesu, 1742.

Life and Law in Early Modern England is on display February-May 2011 in the Rare Book Exhibition Gallery of the Lillian Goldman Law Library. It will also be made available online through posts several times each week on Mike Widener's fascinating Rare Books Blog. One such post revealed that an Italian law library has also devoted a website to images of Lady Justice. The Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia's Immagini della Giustizia includes images of Justitia from the frontispieces, headpieces, initials, and architectural borders of printed books, as well as a discussion of the iconography of her scales, sword, and blindfold. With the obvious joy of a man more than a little in love with Lady Justice, Yale librarian Mike Widener notes: "Our rare book collection owns very few of the examples in the Modena website, so I have new titles to pursue!"

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"Dial-A-Muse" Debuts At Yale

By Nancy Mattoon

Barry Sullivan Analyzes Ginger Rogers In Lady In The Dark.
(Image Courtesy of Beinecke Library.)

The latest exhibit from Yale University's Beinecke Library Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Psyche & Muse: Creative Entanglements with the Science of the Soul, "explores the influence of cultural, clinical, and scientific dialogues about human psychology on twentieth-century writers, artists, and thinkers." It sounds like a stretch to give that subject matter a 21st century technological twist: after all, Psyche and the three original Muses have been around since the 2nd century AD, and psychoanalysis is no spring chicken, having been hatched in the 1890's. But leave it to New Haven's inventive librarians to transform the traditional into the post-modern: the show includes an iPad-full of film clips, and a terrific long-distance feature that could be christened, "Dial-A-Muse."

Picasso's Take On Gertrude Stein (1906).
(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.)

The exhibit's ground floor iPad installation includes archive materials from the Beinecke's film collections, such as home movie footage of Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas; screen tests for the role of Bigger in Native Son from the Richard Wright Papers; and a recently discovered silent film, Monkey’s Moon, produced in 1929 by Pool Films, the film production company of writers Kenneth Macpherson, Bryher (Annie Winifred Ellerman), and poet H. D. (Hilda Doolittle).

Additional film clips from sources outside of Yale's collections include Freud family home movies and an interview with C. G. Jung from the Library of Congress, and footage from popular films related to psychoanalysis, such as Sidney Lumet's take on Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night (1962), and director Mitchell Leisen's adaptation of Moss Hart’s musical, Lady in the Dark (1944).

Sigmund Freud, by Max Halberstadt, 1921.

(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.)

For those unable to journey to Connecticut to take a gander at the exhibit, audio clips related to the writers and works featured in Psyche & Muse can be accessed by anyone with a cell phone. To hear the following brief audio files, dial 203.672.4380 followed by the designated number and the pound sign:

F. Scott Fitzgerald reading John Keats’s “Ode to a Nightingale” (1:45 minutes). Press 21 #

F. Scott Fitzgerald reading from John Masefield’s “On Growing Old” (ca. 1 minute). Press 23 #

F. Scott Fitzgerald reading from William Shakespeare’s Othello (2:45 minutes). Press 22 #

Sigmund Freud, BBC Interview, 1938 (ca. 2:00 minutes). Press 18#

H.D. (Hilda Doolittle), reading from, Helen in Egypt (1:25 minutes).Press 20 #

Eugene O’Neill, reading from Long Day’s Journey into Night (0:25 seconds). Press 17 #

Jack Spicer, reading “Psychoanalysis, an Elegy” (2:50 minutes). Press 19 #

Gertrude Stein, reading from The Making of Americans (ca. 5:30 minutes). Press 24 #

Excerpt from The Theatre Guild on Air production of Lady in the Dark, by Moss Hart, adapted for radio by Philip Lewis, 1947. Press 25 #

Freud's Psychoanalysis Couch,
Now In London's Freud Museum.
(Image Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.)

And lest you think that the Beinecke Library has gone for high-tech electronics over print, rest assured there's plenty on show for the bookish, too. Psyche & Muse features features materials from the Beinecke Library’s twentieth-century collections, including the Modern European Books and Manuscripts Collection, the Yale Collection of American Literature, and the James Weldon Johnson Memorial Collection of African American Arts and Letters; figures represented in the exhibition include: Lou Andreas-Salomé, Antonin Artaud, James Baldwin, Andre Breton, A. A. Brill, Herman Broch, H. D., Mable Dodge Luhan, Max Ernst, Michel Foucault, Sigmund Freud, George Ivanovich Gurdjieff, Moss Hart, Carl Jung, Jacques Lacan, George Platt Lynes, Eugene O’Neill, Jean Toomer, Glenway Wescott, Richard Wright, and Gregory Zilboorg.

Psyche & Muse: Creative Entanglements with the Science of the Soul opened January 28, 2011 and continues through June 13, 2011.
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The Breathtaking Book Art of Richard Minsky

FREEDOM OF CHOICE
Three Poems of Love and Death by Lucie Brock-Broido
Richard Minsky, 2009
73" x  26" x  24"

One day, once upon a time in 1960, young Richard Minsky confidently strode down the hallways of his junior high school, entered the guidance counselor's office, nodded to his advisor, pulled up a chair, and sat down with the aplomb, sangfroid, and radioactive self-assuredness usually associated with grown men who know what's what, who's who, and exactly where they're going.

"Well, Minsky," the counselor wearily exhaled, "what's going to become of you?"

And without a nanosecond necessary for reflection Richard Minsky, as if a proto-Anthony Robbins, recited a goal that had become his mantra:

"Fifty years from now I will be internationally acclaimed as the most gifted and influential book artist of my generation, and renowned as a scholar of bookbinding. My artist books and bindings will  often feature political themes and cry out for social justice and civil liberties. Museums and collectors will vie for my livres d'artiste and bindings. I will be shown in galleries throughout the world, and from August 2d through November 29th, 2010 Yale University will present a retrospective exhibition of my work!" 

The guidance counselor's eyes rolled to the heavens, rolled back to earth, and then the pastrami sandwich and sauerkraut he had for lunch two hours prior begged for help.

"Oh, boy," he refluxed, sourly. 

The Geography of Hunger
by Josue de Castro. New York, 1952
Bound by Minsky 1988
9" x 7" x 3"
"Friendly Plastic," acrylic, endpapers of food and dog food labels.

That tableau vivant, however imaginary, is surely the only explanation for an astonishing career that Yale University is now, indeed, celebrating with a wondrous and extraordinary retrospective exhibition, Material Meets Metaphor: A Half Century of Book Art by Richard Minsky, at its Robert B. Haas Family Arts Library.

But the fact that Richard Minsky began his own letterpress printing business when he was thirteen years old and has remained intensely focused on books and their creative possibilities as an object-medium for artistic expression may have had something to do with it.

A half-century later, his influence has been incalculable.

“Minsky’s work as an artist and as founder of The Center for Book Arts in New York changed the way people see and make books,” said Jae Jennifer Rossman, the Haas Family Arts Library’s Assistant Director for Special Collections.

The exhibition covers Minsky’s work from its genesis - a 1960 sample book, used when he started his printing business in 1960, through “Self-Portrait 2010,” a book that documents the evolution of a canvas, from pencil sketch through many layers of oil paint.

Self-Portrait
Deluxe Edition, limited to 5 copies
copy No. 5
9" x 12"

Many of Minsky's limited edition works will be on view in the exhibition, along with unique works that have become iconic in the world of book art. These include his 1975 binding of The Birds of North America and The Crisis of Democracy, bound in sheepskin, gold and barbed wire.

The Birds of North America, 1975.

The Crisis of Democracy
by Crozier, Huntington and Watanuki for the Trilateral Commission
New York University Press, 1975
Binding by Minsky 1980
Sheep, gold, barbed wire.
8 3/4" x 6" x 11"

Yale University Library acquired the Richard Minsky Archive in 2004. It includes maquettes, molds for castings, and correspondence, as well as holographic manuscripts and early versions of select works. It documents Minsky's exploration of printing technologies from the mimeograph and spirit duplicator to his early use of inkjet printing on handmade paper.

A Reliquary To Hold the Ashes of Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses.
From The Bill of Rights Limited Edition Set, The First Amendment, 2001."
.A slipcase containing:

Minsky fell off the path of the printing press and received a masters in economics. He began work toward a Ph.D. but could not resist the magic of books and print and so left the dismal science to return to and pursue his true muse, studying bookbinding in Providence, Rhode Island with master binder Daniel Gibson Knowlton.

,,,A burned copy of Rushdie's Satanic Verses.

NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR
by George Orwell
Secker & Warburg, London, 1949
First Edition
Binding by Minsky 2003-2006
7¾" x  5" x  2½" + base

The Philosophy of Umbrellas, an essay by Robert Louis Stevenson published as an umbrella.

Open...

...In slipcase.

Yale Installation set-up, July 29, 2010.
Photo: Richard Minsky

Yale Installation set-up, July 29, 2010.
Photo: Richard Minsky

 Minsky's artist books are amazing. His bindings are divine:

Sappho's Leap
A Novel
by Erica Jong

Norton, 2003
Bound by Minsky 2003
12" x 7" diameter

Chateau Guest Book, Normandy, France
Blank book of various vintage handmade papers and sheepskin parchment.
Designed and Bound by Minsky in 1994.
20" x 16"

Snakeskin Binding
Blank Book
Bound by Minsky 1988
18" x 14"
Inlaid snakeskin covers and doublures, handmade paper, linen endbands.
Collection of the Allan Stone Gallery

The Hamptons
by Susan P. Meisel and Ellen Harris
Harry N. Abrams, Inc. 2000
Bound by Minsky 2000
Acrylic, sand and shells from the Hamptons
Above: The book installed on its base. 11" x 15" x 11"

Pettigrew's History of Egyptian Mummies
London, 1834
Bound by Minsky 1973
Linen, turquoise.
12" x 9"

Minsky's deep and ongoing scholarship of bookbinding led to American  Decorated Publishers Bindings 1872-1929, an artist's book, an exhibition catalog, and an exploration of art history seen through publishers' book covers.

Above: the cover of the Limited Edition
Foil stamped Hahnemuhle Bugra-Butten paper wrapper

Typical of stamped bindings of the period, changes in the angle
of the light cause the stamping to illuminate in different ways.
The technique for creating the stamping die was developed by
Minsky from study of the bindings in this collection

Above: the same cover with different lighting.

Of this, what became an instant essential reference, Sue Allen, the author of many books and articles on publisher's bindings, and foremost authority on 19th century bindings, says: 

"Inside this book is gathered an astounding collection of turn-of-the-century bookcovers. Though beautifully produced, it is no mere coffee table book, but comes with full bibliographical descriptions. Grouped together under headings such as 'Automobiles' or 'Trees,' the covers play against each other in a dramatic way. It is as if you were privileged to go into a number of libraries and bookstores and lay one book beside another. In one leap Richard Minsky has put himself in the forefront of collectors and scholars of this period when each cover was a work of art."

On or around the day of his Bar Mitzvah in 1960, Richard Minsky put aside the rubber stamps of his childhood, bought a printing press, and became a man. 

Fifty years later, Richard Minsky is a national treasure.

__________

Images courtesy of Richard Minsky, and Jae Rossman of Yale, with our thanks.

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At Yale University's Library Recycling Is The Law

A Page From: The Passion of Saint Alexander, Pope and Martyr, (Passio Sancti Alexandri martyris papae) circa 975-1075. Reused To Strengthen The Cover Of Flos testamnetorum By Rolandinus, de Passageriis, Published In Padua In 1482.

(Images Courtesy Of The Lillian Goldman Law Library Rare Book Collection, Yale University.)

The last weekend of April 2010 saw celebrations marking the 40th anniversary of Earth Day. Citizens of the world were urged to "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle," to help save our imperiled planet. An exhibit at the Yale University's Lillian Goldman Law Library proves that, as fine an idea as this is, it is hardly breaking news. The collection on display is as green as the Ivy League walls that surround it, but its materials were created in the inky shadows of The Dark Ages.

The bindings of nearly 150 books in the Law Library's Rare Book Collection show that recycling was second nature among European bookbinders as early as the 1300's. These medieval artisans reused the materials they had on hand: discarded manuscripts. The strong, flexible, and prohibitively pricey parchment of these documents proved the perfect product for binding new books. What are now considered priceless volumes, dating from as early as 975 AD, were to these craftsmen nothing more than a serviceable source of scraps.

A Portion Of A German Breviary, Circa 1150-1200. Found Inside The Cover Of Communes i.v. conclusiones, ad gerneralem quorum cunque statutorum interpetationem acommodatae, by Alderano Mascardi, published in Frankfurt by Wolfgang Richter in 1609. This fragment remained hidden until a bomb exploded in the Yale Law Library in May, 2003. Water damage from fire sprinklers caused the book's cover to come unglued, revealing the manuscript page.

The 14th- and 15th-century works featured in Reused, Rebound, Recovered: Medieval Manuscript Fragments in Law Book Bindings, all incorporate visible pieces of older tomes in their construction. Some of these scraps are so tiny they can easily be overlooked, while others are big enough to cover the entire exterior of a large volume. Many of the fragments have remained hidden for centuries. Only when its cover has fallen into disrepair is the secret source material of one of the collection's books revealed.

A Fragment In French, Circa 1475-1525, The Source Of Which Remains A Mystery. It May Be A Deed For A Piece Of Property, And Was Used As A Wrapper For: Caccialupi, Giovanni Battista. De Pesionibus tractatus uere aureus. Rome: F. Minizio Calvo, 1531.

Once exposed, these fragments become a puzzle for scholars and librarians to solve. Discovering the origins of the scraps sheds a little more sunlight onto the Dark Ages. The subject matter, popularity, geographic distribution, changing styles in binding and printing, and evolving script and illustration of medieval manuscripts, are all illuminated by identifying the source texts of each remnant.

Another Fragment Of Unknown Origin, Circa 1350-1450. Twelve Small Volumes Of Corpus iuris civilis, Published In Lyons by Guillame Rouille In 1581, Were Neatly Covered By Pages From A Manuscript Containing Passages From The Bible.

Most of the manuscript pieces in the Yale Law Library's collection have been identified and tentatively dated. The materials chosen for the exhibit bring to light the diversity of texts that have been hidden in the covers of just a small sampling of the collection's rare books. Examination of the bindings has revealed verses from, and commentaries on, the Bible; liturgical materials, including some with musical notation; passages from sermons; a section of Cicero's philosophical text, Dream of Scipio; and, as befits their current home, several slices of legal texts. Most of the fragments are in Latin, but two are from Hebrew texts, two more are in French, and one appears to be in some form of German.

This Volume, Repetitiones decem legum, [Paris, Andre Bocard for Jean Petit, 1507.] Contains Two Unidentified Fragments, Circa 1350-1425. The Page Above, From The Inside Front Cover Contains A List Of Benediction Prayers For The Feast Of The Virgin Mary And The Feast Of All Saints.

The Inside Back Cover Of The Same Volume Reveals A Page From A Completely Unrelated Manuscript, Appearing To Be From Some Type Of Prayer Book.

The sources of some of some of the parchment pieces in the exhibit remain mysterious. On March 19, 2010, over 40 members of the Medieval Academy of America were invited to investigate the display, in hopes of identifying the parent-texts of those fragments which remain orphans. Images of the bindings were also made available for viewing online. This clever strategy has paid off, with the resulting clues from scholars being posted on the Rare Book Collection's blog. Anyone able to make more of these manuscripts illuminated rather than shadowy is invited to contact the exhibit's co-curators, Benjamin Yousey-Hindes and Mike Widener.

Posted by Nancy Mattoon

Yale Exhibit Romances The Last Of The Gentleman Scholars

Pierre-Joseph Redoute, Plum Branches Intertwined, 1802-04, watercolor on vellum.

(Images Courtesy Of Yale Center For British Arts.)

When Charles Ryskamp was interviewed in 2004, he found the reporter's questions about his background so tedious he snapped: "I don't want this to be an obituary." Ryskamp needn't have worried. The one-time director of both the Morgan Library and Museum and the Frick Collection died on March 26, 2010, with the best possible remembrance of his life and career on display at the Yale Center For British Art. Varieties of Romantic Experience: Drawings from the Collection of Charles Ryskamp, an exhibit of 200 works from his private collection, opened six weeks before his death at age 81, and will run through April 25, 2010.

George Stubbs, A Sleeping Cheetah ("A Tyger"), 1788, mezzotint on wove paper.

Charles Ryskamp might well be the last of a dying breed: the gentleman scholar. At age 7, he began to organize, catalog, and label the books in his home library. By age 13 he was buying original art, and galleries and auction houses put him on their mailing lists. Collecting art was a lifelong passion, one he ceaselessly pursued for nearly 70 years. He obtained a first-rate education in English literature, earning a bachelor's degree from Calvin College, a master's degree and doctorate from Yale, and later, adding post-graduate work at Cambridge. (He became a full professor of English at Princeton in 1969, specializing in the work of English poet William Cowper.) But in art history he was entirely self-taught. With a good eye, a sharp mind, and a devoted heart, he created one of the finest privately held collections of drawings in the world.

Josephus Augustus Knip, River Landscape With Distant Cliffs, 1809, water color over graphite on wove paper with double framing lines in gray ink.

In the art world, Ryskamp's area of collecting was primarily English and European prints and drawings of the Romantic Era, or roughly 1789 to 1850. He gravitated towards well-established artists, such as Goya, Turner, Blake, and Durer, saying: ''If you look at the greatest masters, I think you just have a sense of quality, that's hard to analyze.'' His collecting was also governed by pragmatism. He concentrated on prints until the late 1950's, but when they became unaffordable, he moved on to lower-priced drawings. Later, as director of the Morgan and the Frick, he shifted his sights to acquisitions that would not compete with the works of either museum.

William John Thomas Collins, Cypresses At The Villa d'Este, Tivoli, 1838, pen and ink and watercolor over graphite on wove paper.

These limits placed on the collection were, ironically, what made it so important. His commitment to search out works not typically found in museums led Ryskamp to assemble over time one of the world's best collections of drawings from the Danish Golden Age. Rather than focusing on more expensive paintings, his emphasis on drawings allowed him to purchase works that were often overlooked by wealthier collectors and institutions. Ryskamp summed up his prized artworks this way: ''As I looked at what I had accumulated, these hundreds and hundreds of drawings, I realized that I had equally good collections for France, Germany, Holland, Denmark. And that was almost unheard of. I can't think of any museum which would have all well represented.''

Adolph Menzel, Carl Johan Arnold, ca.1848, graphite on wove paper.

Ryskamp hand-picked the 200 drawings in the Yale show, along with co-curator Matthew Hargraves. They represent about one-third of his total collection of works on paper. The show was the realization of a cherished dream: "I have never before known an exhibition to show Romantic drawings of all of these countries together. I have long hoped for such an exhibition, and it is a rare privilege to have this wish fulfilled." The breadth of subject matter on display is as amazing as the array of artists. The works are grouped by content, with sections covering land and sea, the natural world, religion, the human figure, and the imagination. Within each area are drawings by such heavy-hitters as Conelius Varley, Henry Fuseli, Caspar David Friedrich, Camille Corot, Eugene Delacroix, Edgar Degas, Johan Thomas Lundbye, and C.W. Eckersberg.

J.M.W. Turner, Shields Lighthouse, 1820-1830, (trial proof A), mezzotint on laid paper.

In an essay accompanying the show, Ryskamp emphasized his enduring dedication to the arts: "As much as possible I have devoted my life to the appreciation, study and teaching of art and literature." When asked for advice by a beginning art collector he said: ''I think you should go and look. And don't have a goal in mind.'' A life spent seeking out great art wherever he could find it enabled Charles Ryskamp to assemble a group of artworks that will inspire collectors for generations to come. And he added one last brush stroke without which the portrait of an art collector is incomplete: "I collect in order to give to others. I plan to share what I have collected as long as I live and, if possible, bequeath what is left of my collections to public institutions." The greater part of Charles Ryskamp's art collection has been donated to the Morgan Library.

Posted by Nancy Mattoon

Strawberry Hill Forever

Horace Walpole's Castle, Strawberry Hill.

When you think of haunted houses, tortured heroes, mysterious femmes fatales, ghosts, werewolves, vampires, and dark and stormy nights, what author comes to mind? Perhaps Stephen King, Stephenie Meyer, or Anne Rice? Probably not Horace Walpole. But fans of The Shining, Twilight, and Interview With The Vampire might not be enjoying their favorite scary stories if not for the inventor of the Gothic novel, Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford. Yale's Center For British Art and Lewis Walpole Library have collaborated with The Victoria and Albert Museum to create an exquisite exhibit celebrating the birthplace of the eighteenth-century Gothic revival, Horace Walpole's Strawberry Hill. The exhibit is on view at the Yale University campus in New Haven until January 3, 2010.

Horace Walpole by Sir Joshua Reynolds.

Horace Walpole was born in 1717, to a family of great wealth and distinction, his father was the first Prime Minister of Great Britain, Robert Walpole, and his cousin was "The Hero of Trafalgar," Lord Nelson. Walpole himself was a Member of Parliament, but remained mostly uninterested in politics or the military, instead gravitating towards the worlds of art, literature, and design. He was what we now call a "taste maker" or "trendsetter," an eighteenth-century version of Oscar Wilde or Andy Warhol.

Johann Heinrich Müntz, Strawberry Hill, c. 1755-79.
(Image Courtesy of Lewis Walpole Library.)

The trend which Walpole set in motion was the renewed appreciation for medieval architecture, the age of chivalry, Arthurian legends, romanticism, and all things dark and dangerous: the Gothic. In literature, Walpole was responsible for the first English-language Gothic novel, The Castle of Otranto. In architecture, he created from the ground up his own "little Gothic castle," Strawberry Hill.

Armour of King Francis I, One of Walpole's Prized Possessions.
(Image Courtesy of Lewis Walpole Library.)

Strawberry Hill was Walpole's home, but it was much more than that. Like William Randolph Hearst's San Simeon or Charles Foster Kane's Xanadu, it was a museum, a showplace, an architectural marvel, and even a tourist attraction. Strawberry Hill began as a cottage on 5 acres of land in 1748, and ended as a castle, modeled after Westminster Abbey and Canterbury Cathedral, on 46 acres in 1781. The building's contents were as remarkable as its architecture: Walpole was an avid collector of prints, paintings, drawings, enamels, miniatures, furniture, glassware, coins, clocks, silver, armor, antiquities, manuscripts, and books. His collection of art objects numbered as many as 4,ooo, and all were displayed in themed rooms created to enhance their magnificence.

One of Walpole's Most Unusual Collectibles: Hair of Mary Tudor, Queen of France,
Clipped From Her Head Upon The Opening Of Her Tomb In 1784, And Encased In A Locket.
(Image Courtesy of Lewis Walpole Library.)

Horace Walpole died without heirs (many historians have speculated he was gay.) in 1797. He left Strawberry Hill to the daughter of a favorite cousin. The exorbitant cost of keeping up such a grand home caused the Gothic castle to change hands often over the years. Finally, in 1842 the house became the property of the 7th Earl of Orford, a handsome, wild spendthrift with a taste for drink, who married his brother's widow, and was briefly imprisoned for assaulting a police officer. In other words, an anti-hero straight out of a Gothic novel. Desperate for cash, he resorted to selling Strawberry Hill's glorious treasures. The massive estate sale lasted 32 days, and scattered Walpole's priceless collection to the four winds.

Percival Merritt, An Account of the descriptive catalogues of Strawberry Hill and of Strawberry Hill sale catalogues, together with a bibliography.
(Boston: Privately printed by B. Rogers, 1915)
(Image Courtesy of Lewis Walpole Library.)

Strawberry Hill began to deteriorate in 1883, and the trend continued until it was placed on the World Monuments Fund list of 100 most endangered sites in 2004. A massive restoration effort, funded in part by Britain's Heritage Lottery Fund and by The Strawberry Hill Trust, is now underway. The Yale exhibit was organized to highlight this effort, and to attempt to temporarily reassemble at least a small portion of Walpole's treasures sold off over 150 years ago. Co-curator of the exhibit, Michael Snodin, has edited a catalog for the exhibit, which is available as a hardcover book. Phillipa Stockley of The Daily Telegraph named the Yale University Press publication one of the season's best Christmas gift books.

Horace Walpole's Strawberry Hill, edited by Michael Snodin,
New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009.

The restorers of Strawberry Hill hope to re-open the estate for public tours in 2010. However it will be shown without the thousands of objects Horace Walpole collected to complete his Gothic revival monument, which are now in private hands. The magnificence that was Strawberry Hill in all of its glory is now as imaginary as Daphne du Maurier's Manderley or Jane Austen's Pemberley. But lovers of the fantastic realm of supernatural creatures, haunted houses, magical potions, and things that go bump in the night know that Thoreau was right, and "the world is but a canvas to the imagination."

Posted by Nancy Mattoon