Lou Reed Archive

#KeeperoftheDay – The Lou Reed Archive at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

“The Lou Reed Archive documents the history of Reed’s life as a musician, composer, poet, writer, photographer, and tai-chi student through his own extensive papers, photographs, recordings and other materials. The archive spans Reed’s creative life—from his 1958 Freeport High School band, the Shades, to his final performances in 2013.”

Listen to our story about the birth of the Lou Reed Archive on The Kitchen Sisters Present… podcast.

Dorothy Lazard on Rightnowish #KeeperoftheDay

Dorothy Lazard is head librarian in the Oakland Public Library’s History Center. She is the gatekeeper to a long list of books, periodicals, photos and other documents that tell the story of this city. Many of these items would be difficult to find anywhere else, such as “Blacks in Oakland 1852-1987,” written by Donald E. Hausler. This important piece of literature documents of a century’s worth of African American life in this major American city; and I wouldn’t have found the book without the help of Lazard.

Listen to the latest episode of Rightnowish on KQED.org

The people trying to save scents from extinction #KeeperoftheDay

#KeeperoftheDay – The people trying to save scents from extinction

“The smells of ordinary life, from traditional pubs to old books, are part of our culture and heritage – and many of them are in danger of being lost.”
–BBC Future, 01.12.20

Jason Polan #KeeperoftheDay

#KeeperoftheDay – Jason Polan, 1982-2020.

“Jason Polan, an incessant sketcher whose eclectic drawings and art projects — one was called “The Every Piece of Art in the Museum of Modern Art Book” — made him one of the quirkiest and most prolific denizens of the New York art scene, died on Monday in New York. He was 37.” – New York Times

The Potato Museum #KeeperoftheDay

#KeeperoftheDay – The Potato Museum, “the first museum about a vegetable.”

“Tom Hughes and his wife, Meredith Sayles Hughes, are the couple behind the world’s first Potato Museum, the Food Museum Online, and the Food Heritage Center. The museums research, collect, preserve, exhibit and explain the history and social significance of the world’s foods, and bring artifacts and programs to audiences of all ages.”

Pre-Cinema Optical Devices Collection #KeeperoftheDay

#KeeperoftheDay

The Pre-Cinema Optical Devices Collection at Princeton.

Pictured: a Polyorama Panoptique.

Information Hunters #KeeperoftheDay

#KeeperoftheDay

Information Hunters: When Librarians, Soldiers, and Spies Banded Together in World War II Europe by Kathy Peiss

Harlem of the West #KeeperoftheDay

#KeeperoftheDay

Harlem of the West: The San Francisco Fillmore Jazz Era by Elizabeth Pepin Silva and Lewis Watts

PAD/D #KeeperoftheDay

Dear Kitchen Sisters,

Perhaps of interest for your excellent series is the story of PAD/D or Political Art Documentation/Distribution whose archives now rest in the Museum of Modern Art? Two people organized this resource about politically engaged art: Barbara Moore and Mimi Smith and its background story is creating an activist archive to inspire artists to create work for the social good starting in 1980 when most artists were focused on abstract painting and sculpture. Here is a news piece about the group and the archive.

-Gregory Sholette

Theaster Gates #KeeperoftheDay

The Archive House, The Listening House, The Stony Island Arts Bank, The Dorchester Projects…

Theaster Gates is a keeper of Greater Grand Crossing, his neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago. He first encountered creativity in the music of Black churches on his journey to becoming an urban planner, potter, and artist. Gates creates sculptures with clay, tar, and renovated buildings, transforming the raw material of urban neighborhoods into radically reimagined vessels of opportunity for and of the community. Gates resurrects old dilapidated neighborhood buildings, transforming them into living archives, institutes of music, culture, film and gathering, preserving and renewing neighborhoods that have been ignored, overlooked and underserved. The proceeds of these unusual, imaginative endeavors are used to finance the rehabilitation of entire city blocks and the communities that inhabit them.

Listen to the latest from The Kitchen Sisters Present… Theaster Gates: Keeping the South Side.

This story was produced by Alyia Renee Yates in collaboration with The Kitchen Sisters.