Curator Lecture Series to Feature Amy Heinrich Speaking on Illustrated Japanese Books


NEW YORK, November 6, 2008 As part of the “Curators at Home” Lecture Series, sponsored by the Friends of the Columbia Libraries, Dr. Amy V. Heinrich, director of Columbia University’s C. V. Starr East Asian Library will give a talk entitled “Illustrated Japanese Books in the C. V. Starr East Asian Library: Traditional Formats and Modern Interpretations.” The event will be held at 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday, November 11, in Butler Library Room 523 and is free and open to the public.

Japanese Books

Dr. Heinrich will discuss the long history of combining image and text in Japanese books, and how past practices have informed current interpretations. She will touch on ways different audiences in new eras have received evolving forms of illustrated books.

Amy V. Heinrich has been at the C. V. Starr East Asian Library at Columbia University for twenty-one years, and its Director for eighteen. She received her PhD from Columbia University in 1980, and is the author of Fragments of Rainbows: The Life and Poetry of Saitō Mokichi, 1882-1953 (Columbia University Press, 1983) and editor of Currents in Japanese Culture: Translations and Transformations (Columbia University Press, 1997), and has published widely on library issues as well as in literature. She served as the founding Chair of the North American Coordinating Committee on Japanese Library Resources (NCC, 1991-94), Vice Chair of the Japan-US Friendship Commission (2001-2007), and on several other library and academic national and international committees.

A reception will follow the lecture. For more information, or to attend, please respond to cul-events@columbia.edu. To view a listing of events, visit www.alumni.libraries.columbia.edu.

The Friends of the Columbia Libraries aim to cultivate an informed interest in and support for the Columbia Libraries. The Friends foster the growth and improvement of the Libraries through financial and in-kind gifts and provide opportunities for creating, collecting, and preserving library materials. The Friends also promote the visibility of the Libraries through sponsorship of educational and social events.

Columbia University Libraries/Information Services is one of the top five academic research library systems in North America. The collections include over 10 million volumes, over 100,000 journals and serials, as well as extensive electronic resources, manuscripts, rare books, microforms, maps, graphic and audio-visual materials. The services and collections are organized into 25 libraries and various academic technology centers. The Libraries employs more than 550 professional and support staff. The website of the Libraries at www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb is the gateway to its services and resources.

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