Beginning in April 2016, the Library Company will host Common Touch, a multimedia and sensory exhibition curated by artist Teresa Jaynes. Generously funded by the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, the exhibition inspired by historical embossed and raised-letter documents for the visually impaired will explore the nature of perception. The following is a shared blog post from the CommonTouch website, where in anticipation of the forthcoming exhibition we have been showcasing relevant items from our historical collections documenting the blind and other communities with disabilities.
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Camera Obscura! [United States, ca. 1853]. Printed handbill.
11.5 x 5 in.
Picture shows a handbill illustrated with a decorative
border. The document will be described from the top of the page to the bottom. Text reads: Camera Obscura! [new line] There
will be an Exhibition [new line] of [new
line] Paintings! [new line] Given this
[blank] Even[in]g, [new line] at 7
o’clock, [blank] 185[blank] [new line]. In the [blank] [new line] at [blank]. [new line] At which [new
line] Prof. W. F. Johnson, [new line] A
Colored Gentleman, of the N. Y. In-[new line] stitute for the Blind, will
introduce to the citizens [new line] of this vicinity, and the public
generally, without [new line] reference to Party or Politics, Fifteen Scenes,
illus-[new line] trative of some of the features of the American In- [new line]
stitution of Slavery, accompanied by some ap- [new line]propriate odes, “The
Slave Mothers’s La-[new line] ment,” “Appeal to Christina,” “Un- [new line] cle
Tom’s Religion.” To conclude with ten interesting Changing [new line] Views,
magnified, active, and as large as life. [new line] Admission One Shilling.
[new line] Children Under 10 years of age sixpence. [new line] [picture of
pointed finger] Complimentary to Press and Clergy. [new line] Opinion of the
Press.- Mr. Johnson, has been a re- [new line] sident of our village, when at
home, for some 20 years, during much of [new line] which time we have been
acquainted with him. Blind since his youth, [new line] he has, with untiring perseverance
[sic], educated himself. During three [new line] years’ residence in New York
Institute for the blind, he made him [new line] self acquainted with the
science of Phrenology, under the instruction of [new line] Prof. Fowler. The independence and strength of
character exhibited by [new line] Mr. J. in procuring an education, with the
privilege of sight denied him, [new line] is worthy of admirati[o]n; and those who know him, stand ready at all [new
line] times to attend his lectures and exhibitions. He has an instructive and [new
line] entertaining exhibition. – Ithaca Journal. [End of description]
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The Library Company has several collecting strengths and
many often intersect and intertwine as in the case of this handbill advertising
a circa 1853 picture show presented by the blind African American abolitionist,
professor, and minister William F. Johnson. Pertinent to our African American
history, visual culture, and disability studies collections, the print
represents the career of a man whose profession was comprised of intertwined roles
of educator, abolitionist, and phrenologist.
Born free in Baltimore, Maryland in 1822 and blind from a
young age, Johnson is most remembered for his revered position as
Superintendent of the Brooklyn Colored Howard Orphan Asylum from 1870 to his
death in 1903. His earlier career as a lecturer, typically using a camera
obscura to provide an illustrated presentation, is often overshadowed by his
later calling.
Before movie theaters, camera obscura rooms provided a
similar visual experience. Composed of a darkened room in which a light was shown
through illustrated glass plates, the camera allowed for the images on the
plate to be reproduced in color on an inside wall. During the 1850s Johnson not
only informed his audience with an exhibition of paintings of “fifteen scenes,
illustrative of some of the features of the American Institution of Slavery,”
but also created a verbal picture “without reference to Party or Politics.” to deepen
the understanding of their context for their viewers.
By promoting the non-partisanship of his exhibition, Johnson
marketed his presentation to a diverse crowd that would likely not have
attended his lecture if advertised more stridently. People curious to see a blind man lecture on
illustrations, which he himself could not physically see, certainly comprised a
segment of the audience. Enticed by the
spectacle of Johnson, the curious there less to learn about the life of a slave
and more to see Johnson, still received a visual, and more resonant, lesson of
the injustices of slavery.
Audience members also typically partook of Johnson’s skills
as a phrenologist. Phrenology, a pseudoscience that linked bumps
on a person's head to certain aspects of the individual's personality,
character, and mental capacity, had not only been taught at Johnson’s alma
mater the New York Institute for the Blind, but also at the Perkins Institute
for the Blind in Massachusetts. Based on touch, phrenology allowed Johnson, an
African American man who was blind and likely educated through his fingers, to educate
his audience, in a poignant manner, about their personal identity as well as their
character in a society that permitted slavery.
Although absent itself of much illustration,
this handbill provides a picture of the man, the culture, and the society that fostered
its production. The printed sheet implies Johnson’s savvy understanding
of the visual and popular culture of his time to facilitate his mission to end
slavery through the power of sight and touch.
Selected Sources:
William Hanks Levy, Blindness
and the Blind: Or A Treatise on the Science of Typhology. London: Chapman
and Hall, 1872.
1870 and 1900 United States Federal Census, Ancestry.com
“From our Philadelphia Correspondent,” Provincial Freeman, June 23, 1855.
“The Howard Orphan Asylum,” New York Globe, June 14, 1884.
“New York and Brooklyn News,” Frederick Douglass’s Paper, February 2,
1855.
“Prof. W. F. Johnson,” The Christian Recorder, July 16, 1864.
“The Rev. W. F. Johnson,” New York Times, October 19, 1903.
Erika Piola
Associate Curator, Prints & Photographs
Co-director, VCP at LCP
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