Acquired Tastes: 200 Years of Collecting for the Boston Athenaeum

This book celebrates the 200th anniversary of the historic Boston Athenaeum, one of this country's earliest and most prestigious repositories of books, paintings, sculptures, engravings, maps, photographs, manuscripts, decorative arts, and other artifacts of history and design. In this publication, the Athenaeum's role in the establishment and promotion of American culture is the subject of several major essays on patronage and collecting. These topics are both expanded and brought into sharper focus in fully-illustrated catalogue entries, written by members of the Athenaeum's professional staff, on a wide variety of objects representing the breadth and depth of the Athenaeum's holdings, past and present. These objects have been carefully selected not only for discussion here, but also as components of one of the most ambitious exhibitions ever mounted at the Athenaeum, held during 2007, the Athenaeum's bicentennial year.