Last year, while visiting China, Dr. Quimby received a very beautiful and symbolic gift from the Hua Family of Bejing, in the form of a silk and brocade long scroll representing the "Painting of Dwelling in Mount Fuchun". The scroll was gifted to the Pescosolido Library and is now on display in the study nook next to the circulation desk.
The scroll is a facsimile of the most famous work of Huang Gongwang (1269-1354) and renders what is a now a fragmented painting into a singular landscape as it was first created. "Dwelling in Mount Fuchon" is often referred to as a masterpiece of Chinese landscape painting and depicts the area around the Fuchun River in the central Zhejiang Providence. The painting was burnt in 1650 and the remnants existed in separate hands for 350 years, but has recently been exhibited as one in the National Palace Museum.
After talking with Fine Arts faculty member Joe Repczynski, it was decided to make a formal display for the scroll in the library using student carpentry. The project didn't begin in earnest until the middle of the first semester this year when Zane Nishan, a junior, was selected to create the display. A member of the Carpentry for Theatre course, Zane researched the project proposal and hit the ground running.
Using new skills in biscuit joinery, he first fashioned a display surface out of maple (a light colored wood in wide use in the library). After setting up the dado blades on the table saw he created grooves in that surface in order to inlay darker walnut strips and a lip to keep the scroll from falling.
Over two months he glued, sanded, and finished the display as his classroom project. We're still waiting for the acrylic hinges to arrive for a plexi-glass cover, but you can already see his fantastic installation and the scroll on display.
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