Postwar Culture at Beinecke

What is Postwar Culture at Beinecke?

Postwar Culture at Beinecke encompasses an extensive array of materials documenting artistic, literary, social, political, and philosophic developments in Europe and America between 1945 and 1989. Ranging from single pieces to entire archives and libraries of prominent figures of the period, these rich and disparate holdings converge to form a unique resource for exploring the work of creative individuals, movements, and transnational networks that reshaped cultural landscapes both “high” and “low” after the Second World War. Yet there are few guides that could help students, scholars, creative writers, and artists find their way through the maze of these holdings, diffuse and dispersed as they are. In order to be used, the underlying coherence of the collection must first be seen in its general contours.

The Postwar Culture Portal seeks to provide such orientation. Users will find guides to broad areas of strength in the collection, details about how to find and use specific holdings of print and archival material, and information on additional resources as well as activities of the affiliated Postwar Culture Working Group at Yale. We hope you will join us in exploring this new and still largely unexplored terrain.

Spring 2018 Seminar

1968 @ 50: Art, Architecture, and Cultures of Protest

taught by Prof. Craig Buckley (History of Art),

Prof. Eeva-Liisa Pelkonen (School of Architecture) and

Dr. Kevin Repp (Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library)

Wednesdays, 10:30 - 12:20

Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, 121 Wall St, room 13

For more information about the weekly sessions and other related events, please click HERE.

News and Upcoming Events

Come join us on September 27th for the opening of Beyond Words: Experimental Poetry & the Avant-Garde, a new exhibition of material from Beinecke's postwar culture holdings.

Experimental poet Alain Arias-Misson will lead us on an adventurous stroll with giant letters across campus and through the streets of New Haven in the first and only performance of the Yale Public Poem.

On October 17th, David Jhave Johnston will read from ReRites, a twelve-volume work of digital poetry, parts of which are currently being projected onto the marble walls of Beinecke as part of the exhibition.