Lecture: Hilary Mantel: “I Met a Man Who Wasn’t There” The Huntington 2024-10-21 | Lecture: Hilary Mantel: “I Met a Man Who Wasn’t There”
Building an Ikebana Display The Huntington 2024-10-18 | Here's a peek into the process of building this beautiful ikebana display, one of the many amazing things to see at our Orchid Show & Sale this weekend. 🌸
Archivist Day in the Life The Huntington 2024-10-16 | Happy Archives Month! Here’s a look into how we evaluate, house, and create a finding aid for Library objects with our archivist Mari.
Orchids Catapulting Pollen The Huntington 2024-10-15 | When orchids attack! 🫣 Learn why these Catasetum sanguineum and Catasetum incurvum orchids catapult pollen with our curator Brandon.
Books Written by Ghosts? The Huntington 2024-10-11 | Were these books written by ghosts? 👻🔮 Explore the world of "spirit writings" with our assistant curator Sarah.#Halloween #Spooktober
Chinese Medicinal Plants: A Conversation with Robert Newman The Huntington 2024-10-11 | Join us for a conversation with Robert Newman, Dean of Clinical Education, Emeritus, at Emperor’s College, and one of the leading experts on Chinese medicinal plants in North America. Newman, who taught and practiced Chinese medicine in California for over 25 years, discovered a special interest in growing herbs that led him to China, where he served as the curator of the Chinese herb garden at the Nanjing Institute of Botany.
Critically Endangered Golden Barrels The Huntington 2024-10-09 | Did you know that golden barrels are critically endangered in the wild?🌵Learn more about this important cacti collection in the Desert Garden with our curator John.
16th-Century Trilingual Text From Mexico City The Huntington 2024-10-07 | Examine another early learning text from our Hispanic and Latinx collections 🔍📕 Our curator Diego shares insights into this 16th-century trilingual book published in Mexico City.
Leah Sobseys In Search of Thoreaus Flowers The Huntington 2024-10-04 | Take a closer look at these gilded photographic works with Leah Sobsey, one of five contemporary artists featured in our "Storm Cloud" exhibition. 🪞 ✨
First Schoolbook Printed in California The Huntington 2024-10-01 | This tiny book was the first Spanish-language schoolbook printed in California! 📖 Learn more with our curator Diego.#HispanicHeritageMonth #LatinxHeritageMonth
Harvesting Rice The Huntington 2024-09-27 | It's harvest season at the Japanese Heritage Shōya House! Learn about the traditional practice of growing and harvesting rice with our curator Robert. 🌾
The Chinese Medicinal Herb Farm The Huntington 2024-09-27 | Peg Schafer, founder of the Chinese Medicinal Herb Farm in Petaluma, shares the story of the arc of her career. By combining a keen observation of nature with organic farming techniques, Peg has been a leader in the cultivation of efficacious Asian botanical herbs for the domestic market and has influenced many students seeking a deeper relationship to medicinal plants.
Interview with Artist Rebeca Méndez The Huntington 2024-09-26 | What is hidden within a perfect sky? ☁️ Explore our exhibit "Storm Cloud: Picturing the Origins of Our Climate Crisis" through the artwork of contemporary artist Rebeca Méndez.
Rebeca Méndez on Storm Cloud, John Ruskin, and a Perfect Sky The Huntington 2024-09-25 | Artist, designer, and UCLA professor Rebeca Méndez discusses her work Any-Instant-Whatever (2020), which is featured in “Storm Cloud: Picturing the Origins of Our Climate Crisis,” our exhibition for PST ART: Art & Science Collide. Her video installation Any-Instant-Whatever documents 12 hours of Los Angeles’ winter skies, creating an immersive experience that encourages contemplation while also addressing themes of environmental change.“Storm Cloud” examines the impact of industrialization and a globalized economy on everyday life from 1780 to 1930. The exhibition’s title comes from a series of lectures in 1884 by art critic John Ruskin, who observed how industrialization was polluting the skies.Learn more about the "Storm Cloud" exhibition here: huntington.org/exhibition/storm-cloud-picturing-origins-our-climate-crisisLearn more about "PST ART: Art & Science Collide" at:https://pst.artSubscribe for new content from The Huntington: youtube.com/channel/UCdAV5So6ftxYlzcyiklvjzA #TheHuntington #ContemporaryArt #Climate
Water Lily Pollination The Huntington 2024-09-17 | Check out the process of pollinating Victoria cruziana at 5:45am without the help of a beetle! (there's always next time Erik)In the wild, the pollination process begins when the plants first open at night in the female phase (featuring primarily white petals). The flowers emit a pineapple-like scent that attracts beetles, and after they climb inside, the flower closes and traps the insect. 🪲The flower then transitions to its male phase (featuring primarily pink petals) and as the flower opens, the stamens release pollen on the departing beetles so that they carry it to the next bloom. 🪷
When Drugs Leave Their Origin: Situating Chinese Medicine in the Context of Regional Migration The Huntington 2024-09-17 | Prof. Michael Stanley-Baker of Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, explores how Chinese medicine has incorporated new drugs arriving from near and far throughout history.Chinese medicine has a long tradition of thinking about the relationship between the places where drugs originate and their efficacy. New digital tools allow us to trace long chains of connections—from ancient Chinese documents and historical geography, through modern botany and biochemistry, as well as across different regional languages. These, in turn, invite new applications in conservation and medical agriculture, and the discovery of novel uses for these ancient drugs in their new environs.
Early Photographs from La Opinion The Huntington 2024-09-13 | Explore fotografías antiguas de los archivos de “La Opinión,” el diario en español más leído de Estados Unidos. 🗞️ 📸
Guess the Allegory of th The Huntington 2024-09-13 | Can you guess the allegory this North Vista statue represents? Sabina shares a few clues. 🎶 🦌
Cloud Forest Blooms The Huntington 2024-09-06 | 🚨 Bloom alert 🚨 See this rare Deppea splendens flowering in our Conservatory's Cloud Forest!Deppea splendens first entered our botanical collections in 1982, as plants grown from seeds collected by California Academy of Sciences botanists at Cerro Mozotal in Chiapas, Mexico.As of 1986, this area—which was the only known location of Deppea splendens growing in the wild—was cleared for farming. While specimens still exist in gardens like ours, the plant is now presumed to be extinct in the wild.
Water Lily Weigh-Off The Huntington 2024-08-26 | Place your bets! It's our first time participating in the Water Lily Weigh-Off challenge, let's see how much our Victoria cruziana lily pad can hold 🪷 🏋️♀️ #WaterLilyWeighOff24
Walking the Chinese Garden on a Summer Morning (in 4k) The Huntington 2024-08-23 | The Huntington's Liu Fang Yuan 流芳園, or the Garden of Flowing Fragrance, is one of the finest classical-style Chinese gardens outside of China. Filled with Chinese plants and framed by exquisite architecture, the landscape is enriched with references to literature and art. Visitors can find both physical relaxation and mental stimulation when exploring the dramatic 15-acre garden.Liu Fang Yuan is inspired by the gardens of Suzhou, a city located near Shanghai in southeastern China. During the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), wealthy scholars and merchants there built tasteful private gardens combining architecture, waterworks, rockeries, plants, and calligraphy. Many of the features in Liu Fang Yuan are modeled on specific Suzhou gardens, eight of which are depicted in the woodcarvings in the Love for the Lotus Pavilion (Ai Lian Xie 愛蓮榭).Learn more: huntington.org/chinese-garden
Plant Rescue Center Tour The Huntington 2024-08-19 | Take a tour of our plant rescue center! 🌱Working in partnership with government officials, The Huntington offers a new home and expert care to illegally obtained plants confiscated at our borders. 🌍Learn more with our curator Sean.
Transporting Giant Water Lilies The Huntington 2024-08-12 | Watch our giant lilies travel to a new home: our fountain on the North Vista! Stop by to see the plants blooming throughout the summer, and stay tuned for a pollination update.
People, Plants, Pleasure: A Conversation with Zheng Bo The Huntington 2024-08-09 | Zheng Bo (they/them), a contemporary artist based in Hong Kong who works with plants, will join Huntington curator Phillip Bloom for a conversation about their wide-ranging artistic practice. For the past decade, Zheng has created films, installations, drawings, and exercises that allow them to develop deeper, more meaningful, and more pleasurable relationships with plants. These practices ultimately question the ethics of human-centered modes of artmaking and being.
Corpse Flower at The Huntington 2024 The Huntington 2024-08-09 | Join us as we watch and wait for the unpredictable Titum Arum (Amorphophallus titanum) plant to bloom. For the first time at The Huntington, on display is a Corpse Flower preparing to bloom alongside a Corpse Flower at the fruiting stage of its life cycle. Learn more: huntington.org/corpse-flower
Book Slashing in the Reformation Age The Huntington 2024-08-09 | Was Wolverine slashing books in the Reformation Age? 😮 Take a closer look at unusual slashes in an early 14-century book of hours with our curator Vanessa.
Illegal Plant Trade Endangers Thousands of Plants Every Year The Huntington 2024-08-06 | Here's why you should care about where your plants come from. Every year, we lose more plant than animal species to extinction, largely due to illegal trading and overharvesting.Learn more about the illegal plant trade and how The Huntington conserves botanical specimens for the future with our curator Sean.
Italian Sculpture Collection The Huntington 2024-08-02 | Welcome to the North Vista garden! Learn some fun facts about our Italian sculpture collection with research associate Sabina.
Pope Blotting? The Huntington 2024-07-31 | What is "pope blotting?" Take a closer look at this unusual act of protest with our curator Vanessa.
How-To: Orchid Care with Brandon Tam The Huntington 2024-07-29 | Associate Curator of Orchids, Brandon Tam, shares expert tips on how to care for your orchid. With a collection boasting over 1,500 unique species and 3,600 different varieties across 280 orchid genera, Brandon has unparalleled experience in orchid care.
Harvesting Corpse Flower Fruits The Huntington 2024-07-26 | It's finally time! Brandon and our part-time hornbill Erik are harvesting the fruits of Stankosaurus, the Corpse Flower bloom we pollinated last September. 🐦While many of these seeds will be conserved and propogated for our own collection, we will also be sharing seeds with other gardens and institutions. 🌱
Summer Veggie Garden The Huntington 2024-07-24 | These plant friends help fight pests! Our curator Thomas shares a few companion plant recommendations for your summer veggie garden. 🍅🪴 🌽
Corpse Flower Blooming The Huntington 2024-07-22 | For the first time at The Huntington, nearly all stages of the Corpse Flower are on view in the Conservatory! 🤯💚 Learn more with Bryce!
Whats Better Than One Corpse Flower? The Huntington 2024-07-19 | What’s better than one Corpse Flower?✌️👀 As Odora gears up for a stinky bloom, Scentennial is trailing right behind it.Scentennial has bloomed twice before: in 2019 during our centennial anniversary and in 2022. Visit these two Corpse Flowers now in our Conservatory and tune in to our livestream.
Growing Giant Lilies The Huntington 2024-07-17 | For the first time at The Huntington, we're growing one of the largest water lily species in the world! Learn more about Victoria cruziana lilies with Alicia. 🪷
A Conversation with Kevin Kwan - “Lies and Weddings: A Novel” The Huntington 2024-07-17 | Kevin Kwan, author of the New York Times bestseller “Crazy Rich Asians,” speaks about his new book, “Lies and Weddings: A Novel,” with Christina Nielsen, director of The Huntington’s Art Museum.
First X-ray Taken The Huntington 2024-07-16 | Discovered in 1895 by Wilhelm Röntgen, hear the story behind the first X-ray ever taken with our curator Joel. 🩻
Planting Giant Pumpkins The Huntington 2024-07-11 | It may be summer, but we're already preparing for fall. 🍁 🎃 Our curator Thomas is planting giant pumpkin seedlings in the new Kitchen Garden. Check back in around spooky season to see how they are doing!
Corpse Flower Season Begins! The Huntington 2024-07-10 | The stinkiest part of summer starts now 🦨 🌺 We have a new Corpse Flower preparing to bloom at The Huntington! Join bloom watch via our livestream on our channel!
Early X-Ray The Huntington 2024-07-05 | What are these black dots? 🩻 ⚫️ See one of the earliest medical X-rays in our collections with curator Joel.
Civil War Diary The Huntington 2024-07-01 | Explore the #CivilWar from a new perspective 🔍This rare pictorial diary features 53 drawings by James L. Colby, depicting his life as a Union soldier between February 1862 and August 1864.While the diary includes representations of the Battle of Fort Wagner and other campaigns, much of the book features scenes of animals, nature, and people Colby encountered while traveling.
William Morris Doodles The Huntington 2024-06-25 | Everybody doodles sometimes—even William Morris, leader of the British Arts and Crafts movement! Learn more with assistant curator Sarah.
Ant Plants The Huntington 2024-06-20 | Look inside this fascinating myrmecophyte to learn why it's called an ant plant, and how these insects benefit the plant with our curator Dylan. 🐜🏡
A Rare Stoneware Jar The Huntington 2024-06-12 | Explore a new stoneware installation at The Huntington with our curator Lauren, and click the link in our bio to learn more about the mysteries presented by this particular jar in our latest YouTube video.
CLOSE-UP: A Rare Stoneware Jar (ca. 1750) The Huntington 2024-06-11 | Get a close look at this stoneware jar from the 1750s, discovered near an African burial ground and covered with mysterious designs. Join curator Lauren Cross as she examines the jar, one of the earliest stoneware works in our collection.
Gloves or No Gloves? The Huntington 2024-06-06 | We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: for most rare books, clean, dry hands are best. ✋📖 Find out why in this demo with conservator Jessamy.
The Making of Homage to Nature by Mineo Mizuno The Huntington 2024-06-04 | California-based Japanese American artist Mineo Mizuno’s site-specific sculpture, titled "Homage to Nature," is crafted from fallen timber gathered in the forests of the Sierra Nevada, where the artist lives and works. Using yakisugi (shou sugi), a traditional Japanese method of wood preservation known in the West as burnt timber cladding, the charred surfaces of the reclaimed timber in the sculpture speak not only to fire’s destructive power but also to its ability to reinvigorate the land."Homage to Nature" by Mineo Mizuno, 2024, carbonized California oak, steel, and ceramic.
Echinopsis in Bloom The Huntington 2024-05-29 | Bloom alert! 🚨 Echinopsis spotted in the Desert Garden🌵🌺 What more would you like to learn about our Desert Garden from head gardener Ivan?
Feeding Our Staghorn Fern The Huntington 2024-05-28 | Meet (and feed) our giant staghorn fern! 🌿🍌 Our curator Gary shares more about the largest and oldest Platycerium superbum at The Huntington.
Indigenous and Black Fridays: What Robinson Crusoe Tells Us about Race The Huntington 2024-05-28 | David Roediger, professor of history at the University of Kansas and this year’s R. Stanton Avery Distinguished Fellow, considers the circumstances and limits of the Friday character in "Robinson Crusoe" and what it says about the history of race.Often called the first English-language novel, and perhaps the most enduring, "Robinson Crusoe" sizzled, especially after the belated entry of Friday, who became the most famous character of color in British and U.S. popular culture. But of what color and race? In Daniel Defoe’s original account, Friday is written as an Indigenous character. But over the next 200 years, he became, especially onstage, an African American figure, though usually portrayed by a white actor in blackface. David Roediger considers the circumstances and limits of this transformation and what it says about the history of race.About the SpeakerDavid Roediger is the Foundation Distinguished Professor of American Studies at the University of Kansas, where he teaches and writes on race and class in the United States. Educated through college at public schools in Illinois, he completed doctoral work at Northwestern University. His recent books include "Class, Race, and Marxism;" "Seizing Freedom;" and "The Production of Difference with Elizabeth Esch." His older writings on race, immigration, and working-class history include "The Wages of Whiteness and Working toward Whiteness."
Native Land, Contaminated Water, and Solutions to Global Hunger from Mexico’s Yaqui Valley The Huntington 2024-05-28 | Troubles Below the Waterline: Native Land, Contaminated Water, and Solutions to Global Hunger from Mexico’s Yaqui ValleyGabriela Soto Laveaga, professor of history at Harvard University and Dibner Distinguished Fellow, examines Mexico's pivotal role in addressing global hunger in the mid-20th century, revealing the significant but often overlooked consequences that continue to haunt us today.The mid-1960s ushered in an era of the belief in technological fixes for many social ills. Chief among these was a push to end global hunger using designer seeds that could yield more and thus feed more people. These seeds, developed in Mexican experiment stations were disease resistant in addition to high-yielding. Yet to fully function these seeds needed fertilizer—lots of it. In the hurried quest to find a solution to end global hunger neither the social nor ecological impacts were considered.Gabriela Soto Laveaga, professor of history at Harvard University and this year's Dibner Distinguished Fellow in the History of Science and Technology, examines how Mexico became a leading producer of wheat germplasm, how it was instrumental in finding a solution to end global hunger in the mid-twentieth century, and how the decades-long use of fertilizer to produce more food has had devastating consequences today, including contaminated ground water and the health issues of local people.
