Conversations from the Cullman Center: Amalgam: Frances Jetter with Peter Kuper

Date and Time
Tuesday, October 15, 2024, 6 - 7 PM
End times are approximate. Events may end early or late.

Location

Tickets available for In-Person and Online
Event Details

Visual artist Frances Jetter connects her own life to her ancestors’ and their interweaving ties to the twentieth-century labor movement.

Book cover of Amalgam

A uniquely told immigrant story, Amalgam is populated by impressionistic figures, rendered with piercing faces that stare down the reader as if out of an old photograph. The narrative follows Abram, or “Abe,” a Polish Jew who immigrates to America for economic opportunity. He is a passionate arbitrator and advocate in his union but an unyielding patriarchal tyrant at home. In a patchwork of linocuts, keyholes, and hinges, Frances Jetter uncovers the convictions and contradictions that make up the tapestry of Abe’s life and so many others’. In these pages are mini epics depicting the struggle of workers; haunting vignettes of abandoned dolls and forgotten friends; and a love letter to Jetter’s mother, Rose, who hovers in the artist’s mind like a ghost. Twelve years in the making, Amalgam is a profound, multimedia meditation on memory and legacy.

 

Frances Jetter worked on Amalgam: An Immigrant, His Labor Union, and His American Family in Brooklyn during her 2017-2018 Fellowship at the Library’s Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers. She will discuss her book with award-winning graphic novelist Peter Kuper.

 

To join in-person | Please register for an In-Person Ticket. Doors will open around 5:30 PM. For free events, we generally overbook to ensure a full house. Priority will be given to those who have registered in advance, but registration does not guarantee admission. All registered seats are released shortly before start time, and seats may become available at that time. A standby line will form 30 minutes before the program.

To join the livestream | A livestream of this event will be available on this NYPL event page. To receive an email reminder shortly in advance of the event, please be sure to register! If you encounter any issues, please join us on NYPL's YouTube channel.
 

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Frances Jetter is an illustrator and printmaker whose linocut prints, often with political and social subject matter, have illustrated articles in the New York Times, the Washington Post, TIME Magazine, the Nation, and the Village Voice, among other publications. Jetter’s prints are included in the collections of the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, the Detroit Institute of Arts, The New York Public Library, and the Grinnell College Print and Drawing Study Room. In 2016, the Library of Congress acquired twenty-four of her relief prints for “The Frances Jetter Illustration Collection.” In 2019, the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA, exhibited more than sixty-five prints from Amalgam. Jetter has received fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts and grants from the Puffin Foundation. She teaches at the School of Visual Arts.

Peter Kuper is a regular contributor to the New Yorker, the Nation, and MAD Magazine and teaches comics at Harvard University. He was the Jean Strouse Fellow at the Cullman Center in 2020-2021, and his exhibition INterSECTS was on display at the NYPL in 2022. His upcoming graphic novel, Insectopolis, will be published by W. W. Norton in May.
 

GET THE BOOK   

Don't have a New York Public Library card? Get one here!

If you have symptoms consistent with COVID-19 or suspect you have been in close contact with someone who has tested positive, please stay home.
 

ACCESSIBILITY NOTES   
In-Person
  • Assistive listening devices and/or hearing loops are available at the venue.
  • You can request a free ASL (American Sign Language) interpretation or CART (Communication Access Real-Time Translation) captioning service by emailing your request at least two weeks in advance of the event: email accessibility@nypl.org.
  • This venue is fully accessible to wheelchairs. A visual navigation guide is available here.
Livestream
  • Captions and a transcript will be provided.
  • Media used over the course of the conversation will be accompanied by alt text and/or audio description.
  • You can request a free ASL (American Sign Language) interpretation by emailing your request at least two weeks in advance of the event: email accessibility@nypl.org.
     

CONNECT WITH US
Sign up for our e-newsletters to stay up to date on upcoming events and Library offerings.

Please submit all press inquiries at least 48 hours before the event: email press@nypl.org or use this Gmail template.

For all other questions and inquiries, please email cullmancenter@nypl.org or use this Gmail template.

 

SUPPORT THE LIBRARY   
The New York Public Library's free services and resources are made possible thanks to the support of the Friends of the Library. Join this group of Library lovers and take advantage of special membership benefits, like invitations to members-only virtual events, discounts at the Library Shop, and more. Join now.

The Cullman Center is made possible by a generous endowment from Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman in honor of Brooke Russell Astor, with major support provided by Mrs. John L. Weinberg, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, The Estate of Charles J. Liebman, The von der Heyden Family Foundation, John and Constance Birkelund, and The Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation, and with additional gifts from Helen and Roger Alcaly, The Rona Jaffe Foundation, The Arts and Letters Foundation Inc., William W. Karatz, Merilee and Roy Bostock, and Cullman Center Fellows.