Book Conservation: What is it and how to care for your personal collection

Описание: Join Bexx Caswell-Olson, Director of Book Conservation at the Northeast Document Conservation Center in Andover, MA, for a virtual tour of NEDCC’s facility. Get a behind the scenes look at NEDCC’s services which include Preservation, Book and Paper Conservation, Digital Imaging, and Audio Preservation. Bexx will go into detail about some recent conservation projects and will give some tips for taking care of your own collections at home. Recently the Library was fortunate enough to have Bexx evaluate our collection of Mark Twain’s books.

About Our Speaker:
Bexx Caswell-Olson, Director of Book Conservation, supervises a staff of five full-time book conservators, two part-time book conservators, and one full-time book conservation technician. The book conservation laboratory treats rare bound volumes of printed collections and unique manuscripts, as well as scrapbooks and photograph albums. Bexx holds a Master of Library Science with a focus in Preservation Management from Simmons University and is a graduate of the Bookbinding program at North Bennet Street School. Over her 16-year career, Bexx has worked in the conservation labs at Harvard University, MIT, Iowa State University, and Michigan State University. She was also a conservator in private practice. Bexx was recruited in 2018 to lead NEDCC’s book conservation laboratory where she performs collection-level and item-by-item surveys, prepares treatment proposals and cost estimates, and oversees all conservation activities. She is the current President of the Guild of Book Workers and a Professional Associate of the American Institute for Conservation. During the coronavirus pandemic, Bexx has served on the “Operations Working Group” for the REopening Archives, Libraries and Museums (REALM) project. REALM is a research partnership between OCLC, IMLS, and Battelle Memorial Institute to create and distribute science-based information and illustrative practices designed to reduce the risk of transmission of COVID-19 to staff and visitors who are engaging in the delivery or use of museum, library, and archival services. Bexx’s most-recent publication (with Patrick Olson) is “Germany and the Modernization of Bookbinding: Evidence from Michigan State University’s Criminology Collection,” Suave Mechanicals, Vol. 5 (Ann Arbor, Michigan: Legacy Press, 2018).