New Exhibits: Qur'an and Bookmaking

Hewes Library has several new exhibits to view on the main floor.

West entrance: 1788 Handwritten Qur'an


This exhibition case will rotate often to showcase materials from the Monmouth College Special Collections & Archives. Currently on display is a handwritten copy of the Qur'an donated to Monmouth College by Reverend Gulian Lansing, who also donated the college's copy of the Conopus Stone.












East entrance: "Books as Art"


Currently on display are handmade books created in Professor Stephanie Baugh's ARTD 231. Examples of accordian, coptic, and stab binding are displayed throughout the two cases. This exhibit will be available throughout the month of January.

Cultural "Gems" in the Shields Collection

Within the Monmouth College Permanent Art Collections are many exquisite works on a smaller scale. We are delighted to showcase these “gems” from a number of various cultures. Most of the works are from the James Christie Shields Collection (Class of 1949). We hope you enjoy viewing them, now on display in Hewes Library, as much as we enjoy taking care of them in our archives.

Two fine examples of ushabti are pictured below. Ushabti are Egyptian funerary figurines intended to act as servants or minions in the afterlife for the deceased. Oftentimes, they were depicted as farm laborers with a hoe and bushel. Along with scarabs (also on display in the gallery), these are the most common Egyptian artifacts found in collections.

Please visit Gallery 203 on the upper level of Hewes Library during regular daily hours and enjoy viewing these artifacts in person.

Mary E. Phillips
Curator of College Art Collections
March, 2017

Camera Exhibit

Writing with Light: An exhibit of early to mid-twentieth century cameras

If you venture over to Hewes Library this winter break, note the three exhibit cases on the main level brimming with a unique collection of antique cameras.  The cameras, dating from the turn of the century to the 1960's, are a donation of retired Monmouth College physics professor Dr. Peter Kloeppel.  

Dr. Kloeppel is a connoisseur and collector of antique cameras and obtained most, if not all, of the cameras at local Warren County auctions. This collection was donated to the Monmouth College Art Department to foster understanding of the physics, and art, of capturing an image.

Despite the differences in size, material, decade, and design, the cameras here all contain the basics: lens, shutter, and light-sensitive material allowing photographers to “write with light”. No matter your understanding of the physics of picture-making, the cameras can be appreciated as objects of beauty unto themselves. 

The exhibit will be available for viewing until early January. Thank you to Professor Brian Baugh for making this exhibit possible.

Gen. Abner Clark Harding's Artifacts Donated to Monmouth College

The personal effects belonging to a renowned Civil War general and railroad builder will be presented to Monmouth College by his family descendants on Saturday at Hewes Library.

During the 10 a.m. ceremony in Hewes Library, an officer’s sword, a family Bible, an engraved walking stick and a photographic portrait by Matthew Brady will be among the items presented to college president Mauri Ditzler by family members of Gen. Abner Clark Harding.  The public is welcome.

A brief Monmouth College history of Gen. Harding:

Harding (1807-1874) was one of the principal founders of Monmouth College in 1856, having donated the land for its first building and the endowment for its first professorship. Born in Connecticut, he settled in Monmouth in 1835, where he plied his trade as an attorney until failing eyesight made him abandon that career. In 1851 he formed a company to build a railroad from Peoria to the Mississippi River, eventually selling the route to the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy line for a tidy profit.


At the age of 55, despite poor eyesight and health, Harding enlisted as a private in the Union Army, but was immediately elevated to colonel and took command of the 83rd Illinois Volunteer Infantry, a regiment populated heavily with Monmouth College students. Assigned to guard the Cumberland and Tennessee rivers, he held off a Confederate force that outnumbered his troops 10 to 1 at the Battle of Dover in 1863, a feat that resulted in a field promotion to brigadier general.

Following the war, Harding successfully ran for Congress on the Republican ticket. One of his most significant accomplishments during two terms in office was personally securing the charter to build a railroad bridge across the Mississippi at Burlington. He also served as first president of the National Bank of Monmouth. He is buried in the Harding family plot in Monmouth Cemetery.

Senior Art Exhibition: Three Women, One Show

On Sunday, March 27 join three on Monmouth College's seniors as they open Three Women, One Show.  The show will feature Heather Fantetti, Karisa Doane, and Caitlin Mehta.  The opening reception will take place from 1-3pm in Gallery 204, located on the Upper Level of Hewes Library.

Stop by to take a look at the show!

Art @ Hewes!

Several different art exhibits are currently taking place at Hewes Library:

• Gil Stengel and Yuki Muroe have an exhibit of cermanics on display in the Len G. Everett Gallery in Hewes Library through March 18.  The Gallery is located on the Upper Level of Hewes Library and is open the same hours the library is open.  A closing reception will be held on Friday, March 18 from 2 - 4pm in the gallery.  The reception and exhibit are open to the public.
• Located just next door the Stengel & Muroe exhibit, the James Christie Shields Collection of Art and Antiquities is currently displaying Persian Illuminations and artwork from India.
• Finally, the third annual Off-Campus Study Photo Contest sponsored by the Associated Colleges of the Midwest (ACM) has been put on display in the librayr through March 23. The photos are a collection representing the travel abroad activities that students of the ACM colleges experienced while abroad.  Monmouth College's Ben Morrow photograph of a street scene in Pune, India, received an honorable mention and is included in the exhibit.  The display is located on the main floor of the library across from the Einstein Bros. Bagels.

Art & Artifacts: Rome in Miniature

A selection of small-scale Roman sculptures and artifacts from the James Christie Shields Collection is now on exhibit in Gallery 203. In the exhibit are a number of bronzes, including a coin featuring the profile of Hadrian Sestertius, a mask of Dionysis, an exquisite and tiny (!) rearing horse, and a priest figure from Roman Britain. Among the marbles are a lovely head of a matron from Roman Egypt. Additionally, there is an impressive carved wood male figure, also from Roman Egypt.

Several of these works have not been on exhibit here before, so it is hoped that you will avail yourselves of the opportunity to see these treasures, small in scale but large in significance.

Art & Artifacts: Snow on the Nihon-Bashi Bridge by Utagawa Hiroshige

Our highlighted work from the Permanent Art Collections is the stunning Snow on the Nihon-Bashi Bridge from the “Famous Place” series, by the renowned Japanese artist, Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1849). This woodcut, dating from the mid-19th Century, and measuring approximately 8” x 13”, is from our Takashi Komatsu Print Collection, and was donated to Monmouth College sometime after 1937. It is in excellent condition.

The hand-colored woodblock print, known as ukiyo-e (“pictures of the floating world”), depicted the emerging commercial and cultural milieu, particularly around the new capital of Edo. This particular print captures the activity around the famous bridge, in a picturesque snowfall. For a summary analysis of the technique of Japanese woodblock prints, please see page 833 of Marilyn Stokstad’s Art History, revised second edition.

This particular piece is currently on display in Gallery 203 as part of our “Around the World in (less than) 80 Fonts” exhibit, showcasing a number of exquisite examples of calligraphy from our Permanent Art Collections. Please stop by and see it and many other intriguing works of art!

On Display: Monmouth College Insect Collection

Currently on display in the Hewes Library's East Lobby display cases is a portion of the Monmouth College Insect Collections. Student Dusty Sanor spent most of her independent study recasing and organizing the collections. All of the specimens have been collected by former Monmouth College faculty and students.

In spring 2009, Sanor completed a full overhaul of the Insect Collections. She spent time restoring the original collections, labelling each insect, and repairing the damaged specimens. The collection will remain on display until the beginning of December.

Art & Artifacts: Winding Road and Cypress Trees, San Vigilio by John Singer Sargent

Winding Road and Cypress Trees, San Vigilio (1913) by John Singer Sargent

Location: Upper Level outside Gallery 204

In 1970, the college received the painting as a gift from the national women's fraternity, Kappa Kappa Gamma, to mark the 100th anniversary of its founding at Monmouth. Kappa Kappa Gamma had purchased it from the Kennedy Galleries in New York, N.Y.

A 28" by 37" oil on canvas, San Vigilio was painted in 1913 while Sargent, along with his sister and three friends, was visiting San Vigilio, a small fishing village at the south end of Lake Garda in Italy. He called the area a "paradise - cypresses, olives, a villa, a tiny little port, deep clear water and no tourists."

In 2002-2003 the painting was selected to be a part of an international exhibit entitled Sargent and Italy. The painting was on exhibit at the Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art (Palazzo del Diamante) in Ferrara, Italy, from Sept. 22, 2002 to Jan. 6, 2003, and then returned to the United States for exhibits at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Feb. 2-May 11, 2003) and the Denver Art Museum (June 28-Sept. 21, 2003).

Monmouth College is the sixth owner of the painting. It was first catalogued in 1925 as part of Sargent's estate and was then owned by three collectors in London, including the Right Honorable Viscount Rothermere, before it was purchased by a private collector in New York and then by the Kennedy Galleries. More photographs and a news release of the painting's travels are available from the Office of College Communications.

James Christie Shields '49

It is with sadness that we report that James Christie Shields, namesake of the James Christie Shields Collection of Art and Antiquities at Monmouth College, has passed away. Shields, 83, died on September 20, 2009, at Riddle Hospital in Media, Pennsylvania.

He earned his B.S. from Monmouth College in 1949, after serving as a hospital corpsman with the U.S. Marine Third Division in the Pacific Theater in World War II. He went on to teach at the University of Hawaii in Honolulu, Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont, and in the English Department of Collegiate School in New York City. In 1988, he returned to Monmouth College where he was conferred with the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters for his distinguished career as a teacher.

After his retirement, he spent his time studying and writing in the field of Egyptology. The James Christie Shields Collection of Art and Artiquities is currently house in Hewes Library. Mary Phillips, Curator of College Art Collections, mangages the collection and rotates exhibits in Gallery 203, which is located on the Upper Level.

Art & Artifacts: Our Cup Runneth Over by John Clayson Snook

My Cup Runneth Over (1942) by John Clayson Snook

Location: Large mural in the Hewes Library central stairwell

My Cup Runneth Over was donated to Monmouth College by the artist in 1942. The mural was originally installed on campus in the old Carnegie Library building. In 1990, the old library building was renovated and renamed Poling Hall. The mural was removed and placed in storage and subsequently “re-discovered,” restored, and hung in Hewes Library ten years later.

The artist’s wife, Katharine Marie Ramsey, was a 1935 graduate of Monmouth College. The church in the background depicts the Presbyterian Seminary in Oxford, OH that was later to become Monmouth College. 

Gallery 204: "From Here to There" by Stacy Lotz

Currently on exhibit in Gallery 204 is an installation titled "From Here to There" by Associate Professor of Stacy Lotz in the Department of Art here at Monmouth College. She descibes her installation with the following:

"From Galesburg to Monmouth and then back - Monmouth to Galesburg

During the back and forth I am increasingly aware of the artistic changes in the stretch of land From Here To There:

Aware of the sometimes harsh, and sometimes subtle, impact of the changing seasons and weather

Aware of crop rotations and planting patterns
Spring fields – Harvest – and Till

Aware of the movement of cattle from one pasture to another – groups of cattle as they graze and the one individual laying at the top of the hill watching over the others

Aware of tall grass along the side of the road that becomes beautiful round sculpture placed systematically, yet effortlessly, along the road - and sometimes they linger for months, but the real beauties disappear before I go back that day

Aware that these changes are about processes and cycles that
significantly impact my comings and goings"

-Stacy Lotz, 2009

Currently, the artist's talk is scheduled for Friday, September 18 at 4:15pm. A gallery reception is scheduled for Saturday, September 19, from 2-4 p.m. Gallery 204, part of the Len. G. Everett Galleries are located on the Upper (Collier) Level of Hewes Library and are clearly visible from both the stairs and the elevator. A full schedule of upcoming exhibits is also available online.