Cumberland University’s Vise Library hosts Cella Neapolitan art exhibit

Cumberland University’s Vise Library is hosting a mixed media exhibit, “Words & Pictures,” by award-winning artist Cella Neapolitan from March 1 to April 30.

A nationally recognized photographer and mixed media artist, Neapolitan combines photography, collage, and writing to create genre-defying works exploring themes ranging from the power of negative space to the hidden stories behind antique postcards.

Featuring more than 20 works of photography, collage, and mixed media, “Words & Pictures: An Exhibit in Three Parts” will include pieces from Neapolitan’s “Labyrinth,” “StoryBoard,” and “Dive-ins” series.  From Rothko-inspired photographs of horizons to collages of art fabrics, objects, and postcards, the diverse works explore the artistic synergy of text and photography in mixed media.

“A picture may not be worth a thousand words. However, each medium holds power that, when combined, sparks new circuitry,” says Neapolitan. “That’s my hope: that these Words & Pictures will ignite a new way of seeing, thinking, feeling, wondering.”

A Cookeville-based artist, Neapolitan has shown works in nearly 200 exhibits around the world. Her photographs have won awards from Canon, Kodak, and USA Today, and her “porTRAITS” series has appeared in Art-o-mat machines at institutions such as the Smithsonian and TPAC.

In 2007, the Tennessee Arts Commission named Neapolitan to the Southern Arts Federation. She was also selected as Cookeville’s Artist of the Year in 2002 and won Nashville’s Artrageous Jury Prize in 2009. Neapolitan’s work can be seen in her Cookeville gallery misCELLAnea or online at http://www.cellaneapolitan.com/.

The “Words & Pictures” exhibit is free and open to the public. Vise Library is open 7:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Monday-Thursday, 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Friday, and 2 to 10 p.m. on Sunday. For more information, contact Vise Library at (615) 547-1299or library@cumberland.edu.

It's survey time!

Vise Library is assessing its resources and services and needs your help!  You can contribute to a better understanding of what our campus thinks about its library services by participating in a very important electronic survey called LibQUAL.  It should only take five minutes of your time and your response will be greatly appreciated.  You can also register to win a digital camera or an iTunes gift card.

Here is the link to the survey:  Click Here!

The survey will go through March 12. Thank you to everyone who has completed the survey so far!

Oscar nominees that are based on books

The 2012 Oscar Nominees list was recently announced, and many of the nominated movies were actually books first! The list of nominees (for major categories) is below. Any title in bold is one that is based on a book that the Vise Library has a copy of. If you want to check out any of the titles we have, come see us! Titles that are italicized are based on books, but the library does not own them. If you want to borrow those titles from another library, fill out an Interlibrary Loan request form. 

Best Picture: 

• "War Horse" (Ashli says: "Great story about how war affects everyone in different ways.") 
• "The Artist"
• "Moneyball" (Ashli says: "Even if you don't like baseball you'll enjoy this story about going against the grain!")
• "The Descendants" (None of us have read this one, but one review calls it "an audaciously comic debut novel")
• "The Tree of Life"
• "Midnight in Paris"
• "The Help"  (Amber says: "This book is great! Highly recommended")
• " Hugo"  (Amber says: "This 2008 Caldecott Award winner may look daunting at 533 pages but is beautifully illustrated")
• "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close " (Amber says: "A tearjerker but worth reading")

Best Actress: 

• Glenn Close, "Albert Nobbs" (Based on a short story by Irish novelist, George Moore)
• Viola Davis, "The Help"
• Rooney Mara, "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" (Jenny says: "Intense and violent, but it will be difficult for fans of crime fiction to put down")
• Meryl Streep, "The Iron Lady"
• Michelle Williams, "My Week With Marilyn" (Based on two books by Colin Clark)

Best Actor:

• Demian Bichir, "A Better Life" (Based on the screenplay "The Gardener," which was based on a story by Roger Simon)
• George Clooney, "The Descendants"
• Jean Dujardin, "The Artist"
• Gary Oldman, "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy" (None of us have read this one, but fans of espionage novels may enjoy it)
• Brad Pitt, "Moneyball" 

Best Supporting Actress: 

• Berenice Bejo, "The Artist"
• Jessica Chastain, "The Help"
• Melissa McCarthy, "Bridesmaids"
• Octavia Spencer, "The Help"
• Janet McTeer, "Albert Nobbs"

Best Supporting Actor: 

• Kenneth Branagh, "My Week With Marilyn"
• Jonah Hill, "Moneyball"
• Nick Nolte, "Warrior"
• Christopher Plummer, "Beginners"
• Max von Sydow, "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close"

Best Director: 

• Michel Hazanavicius, "The Artist"
• Alexander Payne, "The Descendants"
• Martin Scorsese, "Hugo"
• Woody Allen, "Midnight in Paris"
• Terrence Malick, "The Tree of Life"

App of the Month - Easybib

Since all incoming freshmen receive iPads at Cumberland University, the library has been looking for apps that can be helpful (and some fun) to students in their everyday (college) lives.  Whatever your major is, you can count on a couple of things: studying and writing papers!  There is no way you can bypass these and have a successful (and passing) college career.

This month the library is focusing on the writing papers aspect of college.  No, the library is not going to write your paper for you, so don't even ask!  But what we can show you is an app that helps with works cited in papers. The app that the Vise Library recommends is Easybib.  It helps with any format that you need citations for, whether it is APA, MLA, or Chicago format.   Plus it's free, which is always exciting when you are in college!

Easybib has a search feature where you can search for a particular book you are looking to cite. Easybib also has a scan feature as well.  Say for instance you are in the Vise Library and see a book that is useful to a paper you are writing, just grab your iPad (or other iPod) device and scan the barcode on the back of the book!  It's that easy!  

The picture below shows the search feature:

Here is a picture of the the actual citation after selecting the book.  As you can see this citation has been selected for MLA format.

Another great feature Easybib has is an email citation button.  If you don't have your paper in front of you just click the "email citation" button (which you can see in the previous picture in the bottom right hand corner).  Once you do that an email is generated with the citation and you can select who you want to send the email to.  

Here is showing the email citation feature after clicking the button :

If you do not have a device that allows you to get this app don't sweat it!  You can simply go to

www.easybib.com and use all of their great features on their website! The Easybib website also helps with citing not only books, but also journals, newspapers, websites, etc.  

Hopefully this app helps to take off some of the stress for Cumberland students when it comes to citing papers.  Check back next month for another recommendation!