Exhibits

September 16 – December 22, 2011 The exhibit “Of Place and Memory: The Yizkor Book as a Window into a World Destroyed” at the Portland State University Library told the stories of Eastern European Jews and their communities destroyed in the Holocaust. It was the result of a first-time collaboration between the University Library and … Continue reading the article: Of Place and Memory: The Yizkor Book as a Window into a World Destroyed →

June 27 through September 2, 2011 Take a journey along the Columbia from The Dalles to Puget Island. It is late spring 1948 and it has been unusually wet this year, even for Oregon, but now it’s warming up and today looks like it’s going to be especially nice. Certainly several other communities along the river have … Continue reading the article: “Dikes Are Safe at Present”: The Destruction of Vanport and the 1948 Columbia River Flood →

April 7 through June 5, 2011 Portland State University Library Special Collections presented a “grand tour” of Baedeker travel guides, spanning Europe, Britain, and the Mediterranean region before and after World War I. Karl Baedeker’s comprehensive yet portable travel guidebooks, first published in 1839, answered the practical needs of a new kind of traveler emerging … Continue reading the article: A “Grand Tour”: Baedeker’s Europe and the Mediterranean, ca. 1889-1927 →

January 12 through March 14, 2011 Over the course of three decades, Jeanette and Osly Gates assembled a collection of original letters, newspapers, periodicals and ephemera documenting African American history and culture.  In 1969, they donated their collection to the Portland State University Library to coincide with the establishment of the Black Studies Academic Program.  … Continue reading the article: Highlights from the Gates Collection of African American History and Culture →

September 27 through December 10, 2010 A September Project & ALA Banned Books Week 2010 Exhibit Sponsored by the Portland State Bookstore In May 1970, student film makers from Portland State University’s Center for the Moving Image (CMI) grabbed their cameras and waded into the chaos of the campus “strike,” a student protest in the park blocks that culminated … Continue reading the article: The Making of the Documentary Film, The Seventh Day →

Friday, September 19 – Friday, December 10, 2009 This exhibit celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Middle East Studies Center. Curators, Gary Leiser, PSU ’69, and Professor Emeritus Jon Mandaville, selected significant books and resources from the University Library’s Special Collections. They also presented a lecture on the topic as part of PSU Weekend. … Continue reading the article: History of Middle East Studies in the West →

June 22 through August 17, 2010 In Partnership with the Multnomah County Central Library exhibit “John Adams Unbound” Sponsored by the Portland State Bookstore This Special Collections exhibit featured monographs published and circulated in the United States during the lifetime of President John Adams including historical examples of original bindings and printings. The documents highlight … Continue reading the article: American Imprints from the Lifetime of John Adams (1735-1826) →

May 22 through June 6, 2010 Sponsored by the Portland State Queer Resource Center & the Portland State Bookstore Intended for audiences of all ages, Love Makes a Family was a traveling exhibit designed to challenge stereotypes about lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people. Through first-person accounts and positive images, this exhibit sought to challenge … Continue reading the article: Love Makes a Family: Portraits of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender People and their Families →

March 29 through June 6, 2010 Sponsored by the Portland State Bookstore This exhibit featured original copies of seminal French art journal Cahiers d’art and its related newsletter 14 Rue du Dragon as well as limited reprints of the Surrealist-focused journal Minotaure.  Internationally recognized for their early promotion of some of the most important artists of the 20th century, these … Continue reading the article: Metropolis of the Arts: 20th Century Art Journals from Paris →

January 12 through February 26, 2010 The Black Panther Party was an African-American revolutionary organization established to promote Black Power. It was active in the United States from the mid-1960s into the 1970s. This Special Collections exhibit featured The Black Panther, a political newspaper published by the Black Panther Party. … Continue reading the article: The Black Panther (1970 – 1977) →