UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Penn State University Libraries’ 2024 William D. Minter Lectureship in Conservation will feature guest lecturer Diane Maurer, internationally recognized paper marbler from Spring Mills, Pennsylvania.
For the fifth Minter Lectureship, Maurer will speak on the topic “Travels with the Marbling Muse on the Road to Immortality” at 4 p.m. Thursday, April 25, in Foster Auditorium, 102 Paterno Library, on Penn State’s University Park campus and online via Zoom.
“It’s wonderful to be able to bring nationally recognized book arts and conservation experts to Penn State through this annual event but arguably more special when that expert lives and practices her craft only a few miles away from the University Park campus,” said Bill "William" Minter, senior book conservator in the University Libraries’ Preservation, Conservation and Digitization Department and its Conservation Centre, and namesake of the annual lecture. “Being able to recognize Diane’s life work through this event that brings together book conservation specialists from around the U.S. is a great way to share knowledge and continue to support our field’s leading practitioners.”
Recognized internationally as an expert paper artist and marbler, Maurer is known for decorative papers for use in conservation, bookbinding, book jacket design and in advertising arts. In March 2023, she was among 53 renowned paper artists whose works were celebrated at a full-day decorated paper symposium and exhibition entitled “Pattern and Flow, A Golden Age of American Decorated Paper, 1960s–2000s,” held at the Grolier Club in New York. The exhibition, which chronicled the exceptional creativity of American decorated paper makers, was later published in book form under the same title and authored by Mindell "Mindy" Dubansky.
Maurer, an author in her own right, has completed books on paper arts and collage including “The Ultimate Marbling Handbook,” published by Watson-Guptill in 1999; “The Art of the Scrapbook,” Watson-Guptill, 2000; “The Handcrafted Letter,” Storey Books, 2001; and “The Art of Making Paste Papers,” Watson-Guptill, 2002. Her book “The Ultimate Marbling Handbook” is acknowledged internationally as “the marblers’ bible.”
In Maurer’s career spanning more than 30 years, her work is represented in many collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Cooper-Hewitt Museum in New York; the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Missouri; Harvard University Library; the Museum of New Mexico; the Newberry Library; the Dutch Royal Library in the Netherlands; the Süleymaniye Library in Istanbul, Turkey; and the Museum of Antiquities in Urumqi, China.
Throughout her career Maurer received numerous commissions including designs for Lenox China, Godiva Chocolates, the White House and Penn State. She has taught her collage and surface design techniques throughout the United States and made guest appearances on several television shows, including “Martha Stewart Living.”
She has demonstrated or taught workshops in marbling and paste paper design at many art centers and museum schools throughout the U.S. including the University of the Arts and Historic Rittenhouse Town, both in Philadelphia, the Society for Contemporary Crafts in Pittsburgh and Erie Art Museum, all in Pennsylvania; the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.; Pyramid Atlantic in Riverdale, Maryland; Arrowmont School in Gatlinburg, Tennessee; and the Penland School in Penland, North Carolina. A graduate of Douglass College and Rutgers University, Maurer grew up in Watchung, New Jersey, and resides in Spring Mills, Pennsylvania, less than 20 miles from Penn State’s University Park campus.
The William D. Minter Lectureship in Conservation was established by the University Libraries in 2019 to raise awareness and advance the knowledge of book and special collection conservation history, theory and practice. Past lectureships have featured experts in bookbinding, book arts and conservation publishing and librarianship, papermaking and book and paper conservation.