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“Shared Magma” Exhibit Opening & “Ritual” Film Screening
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Kajsa G. Eriksson. Täkt [Quarry], 2024 Join the Library for the opening reception of Shared Magma: An American and Swedish Collaboration on Sisterhood and Sister Ore, an exhibit, on Wednesday, September 10, 2025 at 4 p.m. EDT at the John Hay Library followed by a screening of the film Ritual at 5 p.m. EDT in the Patrick Ma Digital Scholarship Lab at the Rockefeller Library.
Free and open to the public.
Shared Magma: An American and Swedish Collaboration on Sisterhood and Sister Ore
Robin Wheelwright Ness Iron Rock Hill in Cumberland, RI and Taberg in Småland, Sweden are ancient formations of a rare eruptive rock with shared properties.
Kajsa G. Eriksson The exhibit Shared Magma: An American and Swedish Collaboration on Sisterhood and Sister Ore celebrates the intersection of Late Proterozoic geology and a contemporary friendship between Swedish artist Kajsa G. Eriksson and Robin Wheelwright Ness, Senior Library Technologist in Digital Preservation at the John Hay Library. Featuring original works created from iron-based pigments by Eriksson, Shared Magma explores how deep time, shared lifetimes, and the future entangle.
Smiley, Charles H. (Charles Hugh), “Sweden” (1954). Archives of the Ladd Observatory. Brown Digital Repository. Brown University Library. https://repository.library.brown.edu/studio/item/bdr:39055/ Kajsa G. Eriksson’s research and the international exchange of the exhibition Shared Magma was conducted with support of the Swedish Arts Grants Committee.
Ritual
Ritual is a 55-minute long experimental film by Kajsa G. Eriksson, Lena Berglin, and Maria Magnusson that explores the greed for energy as a social, material, and historical phenomenon. The film highlights how life in urban centers is dependent on nature and the people living in sparsely-populated communities in Sweden. Ritual features eleven Swedish sites of extraction juxtaposed against the ever increasing dependence on digital technologies.
Now through the end of the day, Thursday, September 10, you can watch Ritual online for free through this link: filmfreeway.com/Ritual929
Distributor Filmform (SWE)
The screening of Ritual is arranged with support of Kulturbryggan.
Robin and Kajsa’s Alternative 1984 Playlist of Post-punk, Goth, Dark Wave Releases, & live shows
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Summer With Your PVD Libraries
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Summer With Your PVD Libraries is a partnership between the Brown University Library, Providence Public Library, and the Community Libraries of Providence.
Look for Bruno, the bear, to find our events
Download a bruno POSTER TO COLOR
Thank you for joining our 2025 events! We hope to see you again next summer.
2025 Summer Program Schedule
Partnership with Brown Emergency Medical Services and The Readmobile
Brown EMS (BEMS) has two emergency response vehicles- the ambulance and the non-transport vehicle named, Utility. Utility can respond to emergencies and provide emergency medical assistance/support while the ambulance is unavailable (while it is with another patient, etc), or to get there quickly while an ambulance is on the way (smaller vehicle, easier to navigate crowds/streets).
Meet Utility, explore the vehicle and learn about our emergency medical staff (and students) at one of the Providence Parks listed below Providence Parks from11:30 am – 2:30 pm.
Monday, July 7 – Camden Avenue Park – 64 Camden Avenue Providence, RI 02908
Tuesday, July 8 – Bucklin Park – 109 Bucklin Street Providence, RI 02907
Wednesday, July 9 – Billy Taylor Park – 124 Camp Street Providence, RI 02906
Thursday, July 10 – Harriet & Sayles Park – 70 Harriet Street Providence, RI 02905
Friday, July 11 – Fargnoli Park – 945 Smith Street Providence, RI 02908
Our most popular summer reading event is back!
*schedule is subject to change due to weather conditions
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Juneteenth and the Racial Justice Resource Center
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Origin of Juneteenth
Juneteenth, the oldest celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States, originated in Galveston, Texas in 1865. It marks the date the enslaved people of Texas were officially informed of their freedom — two and a half years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation.
General Order Number 3
On June 19, 1865, Union General Gordon Granger read General Order Number 3 to the people of Texas, enforcing President Abraham Lincoln‘s Emancipation Proclamation, which set all U.S. slaves free on January 1, 1863. General Order Number 3 begins most significantly with:
The people of Texas are informed that in accordance with a Proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired laborer.
Juneteenth Today
Officially recognized as a federal U.S. holiday in 2021, today Juneteenth commemorates African American freedom with celebrations, speaking events, picnics and family gatherings emphasizing education and achievement. It is a time for reflection and rejoicing, assessment, self-improvement, and planning the future.
Racial Justice Resource Center
Brown University Library invites you to learn and reflect on Juneteenth in the Racial Justice Resource Center, located on the 2nd floor of the John D. Rockefeller Jr. Library.
The center serves as a hub for the study of racism and racial justice in the United States and globally. It is a space for members of the Brown community to create new possibilities for advancing research, instruction, learning, and community around ideas of racial justice. Resources available within the center explore race-based oppression, discrimination, policy, and the activism and efforts to confront them across disciplines. We offer this space for the Brown community to deepen knowledge and engage in the work of cultivating an environment in which every person is treated with dignity and respect.
Recommended Resources
We encourage you to commemorate Juneteenth in the center exploring these titles:
- If We Are Brave: Essays from Black Americana by Theodore R. Johnson
- The Civil Rights Movement from the Library of Congress
- Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America by Candacy Taylor
- The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson