BENTONVILLE : Museum library gets rare volume of botanical art
Posted on Saturday, March 1, 2008
BENTONVILLE — Two people wearing gloves gently turned the giant pages of a 19 thcentury book that was among the first in the United States to be mass-produced without having each illustration handsketched.
The Victoria Regia — a horticulturist’s drawings and history of a massive water lily, with pads as large as 6 feet across, native to Bolivia — will be a part of the permanent library at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, officials announced Friday.
Crystal Bridges’ main building, in northeast Bentonville, is scheduled to open in 2010. Alice Walton, daughter of Wal-Mart founders Sam and Helen Walton, announced plans for the museum in 2005.
“Every time I turn the pages, it makes me nervous,” said Liz Workman, the museum’s collections coordinator who helped turn the delicate pages that were about 2 1 / 2 feet tall.
As museum Executive Director Bob Workman answered questions about the book, he reached down as if to touch one of the tanned pages, before Liz Workman, his wife, and another employee motioned for him to stop.
“I was just testing you,” Bob Workman said jokingly before stepping away.
Only about 200 copies of the Victoria Regia were made using chromolithography in the mid-1800 s, and many collectors disassembled the books to showcase the illustrations, chief curator Chris Crosman said. A chromolithograph is an image that is produced using a series of colored plates, rather than being hand-drawn.
Crosman was unsure of how many of the books remained, but said “only a handful” are intact.
The book, published in 1854, will be on display beginning today through May 4 as part of the International Exhibition of Botanical Art and Illustration at the Massey building. Staff members will turn a page of the book each week.
Bob Workman said the book would be kept in the museum’s library archives. He wouldn’t say how many other rare books the archives include, but said the library would be “extensive.”
The library will have a room specifically for viewing rare works, and the facility would be large enough to host a class visiting from a school, he said.
Other types of archived material in the library will include letters written by artists about works displayed at the museum.
Workman said the museum intends to display books, letters and other documents to supplement exhibitions.
Even though policy for the library hasn’t yet been established, Workman said that visitors probably won’t be able to flip through rare books on their own.
Visitors likely will be able to make appointments to see documents, which will be handled by staff trained to handle the delicate items.
To contact this reporter: aotoole@arkansasonline. com
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