Unknown – CARLI Digital Collections Featured Image

The Cullom-Davis Library Art Collection contains over 200 images of works of art that reside in the library, other campus buildings, or on the grounds of the university. The collection is a diverse one, including Frederick Triebel's 1880 bust of Abraham Lincoln, Linda Howard's massive steel sculpture Centerpeace, and the beguiling Plane Magic, a 1993 print by Cathie Crawford. When browsing the collection, I was attracted to the more mysterious work in the collection, those images simply titled "unknown." In some cases, the artist is known, or perhaps a date of creation, but in this example, the artwork is an orphan, without a creator, title, or date of creation.

According to Special Collections Librarian Charles Frey, this piece was purchased at an auction by a faculty memeber and later donated to the collection. It's a work of intricacy and energy, bringing to mind a bird's colorful plumage, the spindly fins of a fish, and the geometric patterns of a snake's scales. The artist's stubborn refusal to draw things to a single focal point adds to the work's suggestion of motion and though I don't know where in the library this piece is currently displayed, I'd like to hope that there's a chance for a viewer to approach it from afar, as I'd wager that the visual effect is striking.

Written by Adam Strohm, Digital Collections Librarian, Newberry Library

For more information about this and other CARLI Digital Collections, visit http://collections.carli.illinois.edu

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