D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation launched the mainstream Hollywood film industry in 1915. Simultaneously, Griffith’s viciously racist film sparked an epic century-long struggle for African Americans to establish an equitable and authentic voice and presence in American film.
CCAHA’s involvement with the Eastern West Indies project for the Moravian Archives started in 2010 when two of CCAHA’s preservation specialists visited the site to conduct a preservation needs assessment and the collection caught their attention.
In the latest issue of Art-i-facts, we learn more about CCAHA's treatment of visionary Pennsylvania artist Violet Oakley's Capitol mural sketches in preparation for a 100th anniversary exhibition in Harrisburg.
CCAHA's Director of Conservation is our veteran staff member—here for 35 years! She looks back on favorite projects and tells us how CCAHA has changed over the past four decades.
One of the earliest projects CCAHA Senior Conservation Assistant Jilliann Wilcox remembers from her 30 years at CCAHA is a series of 18th-century anatomical drawings by Dutch illustrator Jan van Rymsdyk. “They were so, so beautiful,” she says, “The detail was exquisite. I loved thinking about their...
As this issue of Art-i-facts goes to press, CCAHA Fellow Rémy Dreyfuss-Deseigne has just returned to Paris to present the findings of his research project on nanocellulose at an international conference for museum conservators. He is working in a long tradition of utilizing CCAHA’s state-of-the-art...
The 1830s were a dynamic time in photographic experimentation. On either side of the Atlantic, scientists and amateur hobbyists alike traded techniques and guarded discoveries as they sought to capture the world around them in a still image. The first widely-used method of photography was introduced...
The great collectors often desire to leave the world a physical legacy—whether it’s Albert Barnes establishing the Barnes Foundation, Henry Huntington bequeathing his collection to the Huntington Library, or J.P. Morgan amassing the collection that would form the core of the Morgan Library & Museum...
While William Marshall Bullitt (1873-1957) is best remembered as a successful lawyer and outspoken critic of Alger Hiss, he had two private passions: mathematics and book collecting. In 1936, inspired by a discussion with mathematician G.H. Hardy, Bullitt set out to acquire first edition texts by 25...
Ingrid E. Bogel retired as CCAHA’s Executive Director in September 2014. During her 23 years at CCAHA, Ingrid witnessed a veritable parade of our cultural legacy passing through the Center’s laboratory. Artifacts come to the Center from every region of the world, covering millennia of history—the...
