School of Information Sciences

Mak, Pollack publish paper on Cabinet of Curiosity

Bonnie Mak
Bonnie Mak, Associate Professor

An article by Assistant Professor Bonnie Mak and Julia Pollack (MS '12) was recently published in the Fall 2013 issue of Art Documentation. 

The article, "The Performance and Practice of Research in A Cabinet of Curiosity: The Library's Dead Time," discusses their exhibition held at the Figure One Gallery in Champaign, Illinois, which investigated how the materiality of information shapes the making of meaning. By showcasing the physical bodies of the codex, PDF, online and card catalogs, and librarian, the exhibition fabricated an archive of the "dead time" of research in the humanities, and made visible for analysis some of the oft-overlooked practices in the production and communication of knowledge.

SAM_0024.jpeg"We are delighted to have found the perfect home for our work in Art Documentation, the journal of the Art Libraries Society of North America. Where else would we have had the latitude to craft a visual aesthetic that reflects the argument of the article?" said Mak.

Mak holds a joint appointment in GSLIS and the Program for Medieval Studies at Illinois, and her book, How the Page Matters, was published by the University of Toronto Press in 2011. Pollack is reference/instruction librarian at CUNY-Bronx Community College.

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