Looking at the special collections this week was very interesting and I enjoyed the illustrations. In particular I took note of the way scenes were illustrated, in part because of the time I have spent writing our first paper. My mind is still immersed in Orhan Pamuk’s descriptions and notions of illumination. I keep thinking about all the care and expertise that went into creating an illustration in his descriptions. The first printed works we looked at were remarkably detailed, but I found myself wondering what might be lost with mass production. In the illuminated works, I can see the strokes of the artist in the letters and pictures. Everything seems so painstakingly done and I am constantly reminded that an actual person spent hours to weeks laboring over this page. With the printed works, there was obviously just as much skill and care put into the engraving, but knowing that this is one reproduced copy among many disenchanted me somewhat. I don’t mean to belittle the work, but there’s a personal sense to the non-printed illustration that is lost to me.
