Weingrow Collection
Undergraduate Research Project

Jim Dine. Dorian Gray at the Opium Den, 1968. Weingrow Collection.

The Weingrow Collection Undergraduate Research Project is a selection of presentations that were created as part of the course work for History of Contemporary Art (AH 074), a liberal arts elective course, in the fall of 2005. Its principal aim was to encourage undergraduate primary research and critical dialogue. An integral component of the project was the engagement of students with Hofstra University's vital collections in support of the University's teaching mission, together with the thoughtful public presentation of the students' research. A further objective was the cultivation of intellectual relationships between various members of the general faculty in support of this student-focused research project. This ancillary engagement included the curator of the library-held collection, an adjunct instructor, a computer operations facilitator, and a full-time professor.

Each student was assigned an item from the Muriel and Howard L. Weingrow Collection of Avant-garde Art and Literature. The items were loosely related to the students' major fields of study. The students examined and researched the study items, and were charged with describing them and placing them into their respective social, historical, and art contexts. The students were asked to select a limited number of images from the study item, and these selections were scanned and provided to them. They were also encouraged to introduce independently procured images, including those culled from books, journals, the Internet, and/or other sources. The students developed their research into short visual presentations, using PowerPoint, and presented them to the entire class, exposing all the students in the class to the research.

The undergraduate students, ranging from freshmen to seniors, spanned a variety of majors and schools and diverse levels of experience, knowledge, and facility with art history, research, and electronic presentation media. Accommodations were made for the latter in the form of technical support arranged by the Department of Special Collections. A selection of these presentations is displayed here to offer, in addition to their intrinsic value, a pedagogical model, as well as to express undergraduate student views of the collection and as evidence of undergraduate scholarship.

The unique forms of the individual presentations reveal the students' varied relationships with the design and subject matter of each item. These formally divergent presentations are linked by a mostly consistent documentation style that was adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style. In addition, an independent copy editor helped to refine the projects at one point in their development, though not in their final stages. The projects were ultimately left in a relatively rough state, so that they would display part of the work process. In the end, the presentations were converted into Portable Document Format (PDF), causing some changes in style and font.

Hetty MacLise. Front Cover of Aspen 9, 1971. Weingrow Collection

The Weingrow Collection Undergraduate Research Project was organized by Bronwyn Hannon, Curator of Acquisitions, Department of Special Collections, and Robert Thill, Adjunct Instructor, Department of Fine Arts, Art History, and Humanities, with the support of Professor Geri Solomon, Assistant Dean of Special Collections, and the Department of Special Collections. The conversion from the original PowerPoint presentations to PDF and the design of the Web site were completed by Joshua Liebman, Computer Operations Facilitator, Axinn Library. French translation for Man Ray's La photographie n'est pas l'art, with a foreword by André Breton, is by David A. Powell, Professor of French.

DISCLAIMER
Images and text displayed here are presented as part of an undergraduate class project for non-profit educational purposes. All members of the Hofstra community are required to comply with United States copyright law as well as the University's Electronic Reserves Copyright Policy in the reproduction, display, and use of copyright images and text. Where applicable, permission must be obtained from the copyright owner for the reproduction, display, and use of copyrighted images and text.

The Research Projects

(Click the project image to view in pdf format)

	Study Item: Dino Alfieri and Luigi Freddi, eds., Exhibition of the Fascist Revolution: 1st Decennial of the March on Rome (Rome: Partito Nationale Fascista, 1933). Student: Nicole Marzigliano, Senior, Bachelor of Arts in Art History, Department of Fine Arts, Art History, and Humanities; College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
	Study Item: Man Ray, La photographie n'est pas l'art, with a foreword by André Breton (Paris: GLM, 1937). Student: Celise Remy, Sophomore, Bachelor of Arts, Undeclared major, now pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in Photography, Department of Fine Arts, Art History, and Humanities; College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
	Study Items: Murray Korman with Salvador Dalí, Dream of Venus, Six gelatin silver photographs, 1939. Student: Christine Trotter, Sophomore, Bachelor of Arts, Undeclared major, now pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in early and elementary education, School of Education and Allied Human Services, and speech communications, School of Communications.
	Study Items: Marcel Duchamp: Pasadena Art Museum; A Retrospective Exhibition, October 8 through November 3, 1963 (Pasadena, CA: Pasadena Art Museum, 1963) and Rrose Sélavy [Marcel Duchamp], A Poster Within a Poster, 1963. Student: Kerry Camerer, Sophomore, Bachelor of Arts in Public Relations, Department of Journalism, Media Studies and Public Relations; School of Communication.
	Study Item: Aspen, no. 9 (New York: Roaring Fork Press, 1965-71) (New York: Aspen Communications, Inc., 1971). Student: Timothy Gann, Freshman, Bachelor of Arts in Film Studies and Production in the Department of Audio, Video and Film; School of Communication.
	Study Item: Jim Dine, "The Picture of Dorian Gray": A Working Script for the Stage from the Novel by Oscar Wilde with Original Images and Notes on the Text by Jim Dine, 1968. Student: Elise Meyers, Junior, Bachelor of Arts in Art History, Department of Fine Arts, Art History, and Humanities (minor: Drama); College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
	Study Item: S.M.S., April 1968 no. 2 (New York: The Letter Edged in Black Press, 1968). Student: Ana Piazza, Junior, Bachelor of Arts in Art History, Department of Fine Arts, Art History, and Humanities, and in Italian, Department of Romance Languages and Literatures; College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.