Posted by Candice on Friday, Oct 16, 2015
This year's Art Purchase Prize contest has resulted in the purchase of eight new works of original art. During the annual contest, the Library solicits art from artists who live, work, or exhibit in the Iowa City area; the art is then judged by the Library's Art Advisory Committee, made up of six local residents who are involved with, and have an interest in, the arts. Iowa City has a very vibrant and active arts community, and the contest always brings in a wonderful variety of entries.
The art will be on display during the months of December and January, and then will be added to the Library's Art-To-Go collection of framed artwork. Works from this collection can be checked out for two months by anyone with an ICPL library card.
The winning entries are: Calliope (water soluble oil on paper, monotype) by Pamela Read; Contact (oil on canvas) by John Tiffany; Ghosts of the Mississippi: Blackhawk Bridge (photograph) by Rebecca Miller; It's Almost 1997 (oil on paper) by Phil Ochs; Red Barn & Winter Trees (acrylic on canvas) by Lianne Westcot; Still Life with Metal Pitcher & Pears (watercolor and pastel on paper) by David Noyes; and View From Overpass I & II (charcoal on paper) by Joe McKenna.
I never thought I would laugh out loud reading a Churchill biography, but leave it to Erik Larson to make that happen. A consummate researcher, he has the inscrutable knack for bringing people and past events to life, and with Churchill being, in some ways, a very unique and peculiar person, laugh I did. Not to make light of the topic of interest, which is the very specific time during World War II where Churchill has just been elected PM, France is just getting ready to capitulate to the Germans, and Germany is just about to bomb England. It's intense and overwhelming and imminent. Larson's book is the Churchill/WWII book for those who might have said they'd never read such a book, who might think it's not interesting or too remote. -Candice