Posts by Sherri Machlin

One of the goals of exhibiting art in our library is to highlight the talents of local community residents. Fred Gutzeit is not only a frequent library patron at the Mulberry Street Library, but a vibrant visual artist who wanted to contribute his work so that other library-goers could enjoy and contemplate art during their visits here. Fred's been making art in this neighborhood for over 40 years. Much of his work has been heralded by the press, and exhibited in galleries in SoHo and the East Village. I 

On view now through May 28, 2013 at the Mulberry Street Library is NER BECK: An Exhibition of Photographs of Lost and Found New York City Street Art. Ner, a New York City graphic artist and designer, has had a lifelong interest in overlooked street art captured in photographs. These images are found on his daily walks in neighborhoods throughout the city. I spoke with Ner about his photography and his philosophy.

Ner Beck with 

The Occupy Wall Street LibraryThe exhibit 'Brother, Can You Spare a Stack,' on view at the Center for Book Arts through March 30th, is a thoughtful consideration of the contemporary state of libraries by 13 socially engaged artists, librarians, and art collectives. Curated by Yulia Tikhonova, who organized the exhibition MAPnificent at the Mulberry Street Library in 2012, 'Brother, Can You Spare a Stack' breathes to life 

Whose art is showing now at the Mulberry Street Library? Why, This is Kozar! William Kozar's exhibit This is Kozar, Don't Hate me Because I'm Beautiful - Glitter Compound Paintings, is on view through January 2, 2013. An art opening and art giveaway will take place on Saturday December 22, 2012 from 11 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. in our Community Room.

William 

Meet Bobbi Beck — our latest artist on exhibit at Mulberry Street Library through October 27. 2012. She has already exhibited at several other branches of the New York Public Library, and has always found libraries to be a welcoming refuge and source of inspiration for her work.

These drawings are autobiographical and reflect her day-to-day observations and feelings. They convey her emotional and visual renderings of humor, love, gender conflicts, marriage, family, health, joy and sorrow, anguish and global 

Mulberry Street Library was very excited to receive a grant from Lifetime Arts this year to participate in their Creative Aging program. Lifetime Arts is an organization devoted to enriching the lives of older New Yorkers through both the visual and the performing arts. We received our grant to offer Drawing From Life Experience, an 8-week drawing class for older New Yorkers. The students learned the principles of still life and live-model drawing, using a variey of papers and drawing materials. The culminating event on May 12, 2012 was held in our 

Primarlly I chose You Know Nothing of My Work! to highlight in the Reader's Den because I am a huge fan of its author, Douglas Coupland. He is famous for being associated with the phrase Generation X*, now a term nearly as well known as Marshall McLuhan's "global village." Coupland is the author of Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture,

It is worth noting that both Marshall McLuhan and his biographer Douglas Coupland, each keen observers of modern communication technologies, are both from Canada. It is also a place called home to Harold Adams Innis, a contemporary of McLuhan's, who was another early pioneer of media studies. Coupland says of Innis and McLuhan "This ability to contemplate wide distances with no overriding imperialist agenda gave both men a sense 

A meme, according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, is defined as "an idea, behavior or style that spreads from person to person within a culture." Memes these days spread like wildfire. Everything from celebrity gossip to socio-political movements jump from one mind to the next seemingly faster than the speed of light with the ease of electronic communications. This was Marshall McLuhan's modern vision, though his thought processes were extrapolated from historical roots.

Jenny HolzerThe subject of McLuhan's 

You Know Nothing of My Work! In case you know nothing of his work, we shall open April's book discussion of Douglas Coupland's biography of Herbert Marshall McLuhan with a video clip of the famous scene from Woody Allen's Annie Hall. Coupland, author of

On View at Mulberry Street Library from March 5 through April 28, 2012 are paintings by the artist Rebecca Memoli. The series, called Evaluation, is influenced by Dutch Golden Age still life. Evaluation is a visual meditation on an emotional state or situation in the artist's life. Although still-lives are traditionally created void of narrative, these pieces infer a subtle narrative using everyday objects. Often dirty, used, dank, or broken, the objects resonate 

I'm speaking with Laura Perez Harris, one of the founding members of Throat, a Brooklyn based art collective comprised of recent grads from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). I invited Throat to explore the Library as a public art space, and they gathered over 20 + artists to contribute pieces in a variety of mediums — drawing, painting, sculpture, fabric, even glass and plastic. Their works will be on view throughout the Mulberry Street Library through February 29, 2012. The modern ways 

Hey animal lovers! Yeah, I'm looking at you.

Welcome to Truth is Stranger than Fiction — an occassional BiblioCommons list devoted to special topics in non-fiction. The focus of this month's list is on quirky animal stories! From elephants to oysters, pandas to puppies, there is sure to be a story to make even the greatest of grinches smile. 

For most of us, it would be quite difficult to just hop over to Australia to spend time with a 

On view at Mulberry Street Library in the Great Room is Harry Newman's photographic series, de-composition. Newman has presented in group and solo shows in New York and California, and his images were recently acquired for the permanent collection of the Dave Bown Projects. His most recent show, Last Woods, was presented in September 2010 by the Open Space Gallery in Brooklyn. This is the first exhibition of his latest series,

Crystal clear, turquoise water. White powdery sand. Intoxicating rum punch.

Second degree sunburn.

What do all these things have in common? Just a smattering of experiences I recently acquired during a six-day trip to Barbados.

The Serrano ham-shaped island, about twice the size of Washington, D.C., is home to a population of roughly 280,000 people, making it one of the more populous Caribbean islands. Tourism plays a prominent role in the economy, as does manufacturing, but the nation still holds to the legacy of the sugar cane harvest 

The Maine of my imagination finally became a reality this summer, with a brief road trip to the land of many lobster.

After the fourth hour of highway driving towards our destination, entertainment hit a plateau. "What's the state motto of Maine?" I wondered aloud to my co-pilot.

"Dirigo," it was revealed in Google. "Which means 'I direct.' But the license 

Something surreal is happening on the lower level of Mulberry Street Library this summer: Haitian-American artist Christophe Clavier has five paintings on display. Influenced by sources such as the surrealists, French classical painting, and Roman mythology, the artist conjures up a world of mystical imagery.

Clavier was born in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti in 1977. He began drawing at the age of six, inspired by the drawings in an old 

Our final week of April in the Reader's Den will focus on the selected works of poets contributing to a new poetry and arts journal, The L.E.S Review, founded by poet, artist, and Pratt Institute Library and Information Science student Jesi Bender.

In the five years Jesi has lived in New York City, she has accumulated friends in all facets of the arts, and worked for various art institutions throughout Manhattan and Williamsburg.  In other words, 

Once upon a time, when I was a backpacking young Bohemian visiting Prague, I had a roomate who introduced me to the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke. Having toted the books with him across continents for quiet contemplation, I wondered, what was it about Rilke's words that inspired such steadfast devotion?

Born in Prague in 1875 in what was then the Austro-Hungarian empire,