Exhibit Space
Current Exhibition
Object Lessons: Selections from the Conservation Services Historic Bookbinding Models Collection
March 6 through August 16, 2024
Upcoming Exhibitions
Watson Library Centennial
Fall 2024
Recent Exhibitions
To the Great Variety of Readers: Celebrating the 400th Anniversary of Shakespeare’s First Folio
September 2023 through January 2024
The inaugural exhibit in a new series of exhibitions co-curated by KU faculty and Spencer librarians and funded by a major gift from David Bergeron and Geraldo Sousa.
Photographic Treasures of Historic Leavenworth, Kansas
February through July 2023
A traveling exhibit from the Leavenworth County Historical Society with supplemental materials from Spencer Research Library.
Keeping the Books: The Rubinstein Collection of the Orsetti Family Business Archive
September 2022 through February 2023
Past Exhibitions
Mary Huntoon: Artist and Art Therapist
August through November 2021
Imagined Worlds: Writers and the Process of Speculative Fiction
January 2020 through January 2021
Unseen Hands: Care and Preservation of KU Libraries’ Collections
July 2019 through January 2020
Meet the Spencers: A Marriage of Arts and Sciences
January through June 2019
50 for 50: Celebrating Fifty Years of Kenneth Spencer Research Library
September 2018 through January 2019
The Art of Nature: Natural History Art and Illustration by D.D. Tyler
June through August 2018
Women's Athletics at KU: From Physical Education to Recognized Athletic Program
January through May 2018
To Make the World Safe for Democracy: Kansas and the Great War
September 2017 through January 2018
Histories of the English Language
June through August 2017
Education: The Mightiest Weapon
February through May 2017
In the Shadow of Cortés: From Veracruz to Mexico City
A traveling exhibit from Indiana University Bloomington with supplemental materials from Spencer Research Library
September through December 2016
Easter 1916: Rebellion and Memory in Ireland
February through July 2016
Achievement of a Dream: The Birth of the University of Kansas
September through December 2015
All Creeping Things: A History of Herpetological Illustration
An exhibit by graduate students in KU's Museum Studies program
May through August 2015
Free Speech in America: The Wilcox Collection at 50
February 6 through April 18, 2015
Ornithological Illustration in the Age of Darwin: The Making of John Gould's Bird Books
September through November 2014
Legacy of the White City: Revisiting the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893
An exhibit by graduate students in KU's Museum Studies program
May through August 2014
The Magic of Oz: A Collection Celebrating a Classic
Materials from the collection of KU alumna and lifelong Oz collector Jane Albright
January through April 2014
Plainly Spoken
A traveling exhibit sponsored by the Midwest Chapter of the Guild of Book Workers
November 2013 through January 2014
Quantrill’s Raid on Lawrence: Stories of Loss, Destruction and Survival
August through October 2013
River City Rebels: Beat Poetry in Lawrence
An exhibit by graduate students in KU's Museum Studies program
May through July 2013
100 Years of Jayhawks: 1912-2012
December 2012 through March 2013
Riddle Me This: A History of Games and Puzzles
An exhibit by graduate students in KU's Museum Studies program
May through August 2012
Discover Kenneth Spencer Research Library
November 2011 through April 2012