By Mina Zarfsaz
Last week, we took a tour at the Science History Institute with our current Artist Resident, Laura Splan. We were able to see the Institute's library and peak into the huge archive of material, objects and artifacts that the Institute is archiving for public access and viewing.
If you are not familiar with the Institute, take a look at their website. There are also permanent exhibitions and changing galleries on site, telling us interesting stories of science and technology that are worth checking.
Formed by the merger of the Chemical Heritage Foundation and the Life Sciences Foundation, the Science History Institute collects and shares the stories of innovators and of discoveries that shape our lives. We preserve and interpret the history of chemistry, chemical engineering, and the life sciences. Headquartered in Philadelphia, with offices in California and Europe, the Institute houses an archive and a library for historians and researchers, a fellowship program for visiting scholars from around the globe, a community of researchers who examine historical and contemporary issues, an acclaimed museum that is free and open to the public, and a state-of-the-art conference center.
Making Modernity, the Arnold O. Beckman permanent exhibition, is currently on view as a survey of chemistry in shaping the modern world. There is a lot of interesting things to see and absorb at this exhibition from instruments, objects to bizarre facts and stories of the evolution of sciences in color, and chemistry and much more.
Making Modernity
Age of Alchemy, another exhibition at the Institute is curated by Elisabeth Berry Drago and highlights works form the Eddleman and Fisher collections of the Institute. Here is an interview with the curator that tells us everything we need to know about the amazing paintings and objects on view.
detail from painitngs at Age of Alchemy
