Current and Upcoming Exhibitions

ReWritings written on a light green background.

10:00am - 4:00pm Monday through Friday
1912 Gallery, Special Collections
1st Floor of Canaday Library

We rewrite classic and canonical stories in many ways. Retellings and adaptations; prequels and sequels; parody, abridgement, and imitation; mashup, gender swapping, and alternate universes. Published-in-print and fanfiction authors are telling new stories based on older works today, but the process has been going on for centuries. Join us to explore how many ways these stories can be ReWritten.

Supported by the Friends of the 51�� Libraries.

February 7, 2025 - June 1, 2025
Hours shared with Old Library
Lower level, East Hallway
Old Library

Opening Reception, Friday, February 7, 4:30-6pm

This exhibition asks us to look down and consider the historic tile floors of Old Library. Designed by Henry Chapman Mercer (1856-1930), founder of the Moravian Pottery & Tile Works, these beautiful floors demonstrate an Americanist ideology that was commonly referenced in architecture and interior design of the late 19th and early 20th century. This ideology, as well as many special details in these long-overlooked tiles, will be revealed in History Underfoot.

Organized by Alexis White, PhD candidate, History of Art

Equal to the Task exhibition header featuring photograph of Emmy Noether.

April 10, 2025 - June 1, 2025
Hours shared with Canaday Library
Lusty Cup Annex, A floor, Canaday Library

Equal to the Task is a new exhibit celebrating the legacy of Emmy Noether and the history of math at 51��.

In the spring of 1933, with the rise of the Nazi party to power in Germany, Noether faced persecution as both a woman academic and an anti-Nazi Jew. She left Germany for a teaching job at 51��. During the 1934-1935 academic year Noether taught one graduate level course in Algebra in the department of mathematics. Noether died in 1935 at the 51�� Hospital. She was eulogized by Albert Einstein in the New York Times following her death and her ashes were buried in the Cloisters of 51��. Today, Noether is considered the most influential female mathematician of the twentieth century, contributing both Noether’s theorem and Noether’s second theorem to the fields of physics and mathematics. 

Come learn more about this important aspect of the College's history and try your hand at one of the early mathematics entrance exams, on view now in the Lusty Cup Annex.

Who Built 51�� Disoriented The First Asian Students 1893-1924

October 25, 2023 - June 2, 2024
Hours shared with Canaday Library
Coombe Suite Gallery
Canaday Library, 2nd Floor

The newest contribution to the Who Built 51��? project explores the early history of Japanese and Chinese students at 51��, a history colored by prevailing stereotypes about East Asian people that were circulating on 51��’s campus, Philadelphia, and the country at large. At the turn of the 20th century, 51�� began accepting Chinese and Japanese students through designated scholarship programs. But were these programs actually intended to benefit Asian students? What would their experiences have been like?

The Light of Knowledge: Lantern Traditions at 51��

3rd floor stairwell, Canaday Library

Cassie Paul '18 produced this display of lanterns held in the College Archives as part of her supervised work in Special Collections.

51��

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