In the UI Center for the Book’s part of the hemisphere, we are shifting from late harvest in late autumn to a season of lights in the darkness. Gifts and gratitude mark this stretch of the calendar, when harvests and light recall elemental forms of human community. Over the last twenty months, the Center has reached out to its community and we could not be more grateful for your support. Art, teaching, and scholarship might be construed as giving vocations, ways of being that share, nurture, and enlighten—that make the world larger. Books arguably embody those ideals, supplying light and sustenance, hinted at in the gorgeous art of Bobby Henderson (MFA, Class of 2021) shown above, where energy and radiance transform the willing viewer. That we can even aspire to such ideals we owe to your extraordinary generosity.

UICB 2021, the challenge grant generously provided by the Windgate Charitable Foundation, is nearing its close. We have raised over $2.3 million! We are closing in on our goal, and we must get there by December 31, 2021. There are still some gifts in play, but we want to make sure we finish strong.  We are so close and every dollar will count.

Can you help us? Please consider a gift in these last four weeks as we seed the next generation of book artists and book scholars! You can donate here and you can learn more about UICB 2021 here. Thank you!