Displaying more than 40 rare books from the Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library, Bound to Art: Illustrated Books from the Edmund S. Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library is part of an 18-month celebration of the facility’s 25th anniversary. The college’s book collection ranges from incunabula of printing’s infancy to the finely printed works of today’s flourishing book arts movement.

The ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Museum of Art exhibition Bound to Art, the first-ever exhibit of these holdings, presents a selection of illustrated books spanning nearly 500 years. It will be accompanied by a full-color illustrated catalog, with photography and design by Will Ash of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Imaging and Computing Center (.

The show opens with a 6 p.m. reception on Friday, Jan. 14, and ends March 25. In addition, Katherine Stefko, director of the archives and the curator of Bound to Art, leads an informal conversation about the exhibition at 6 p.m. Monday, March 7, at the museum.

“There’s a remarkable range of history, forms of illustration and subject matter, from religion to biology and from physics to poetry,” says Stefko. “There really is something for everyone.

“These books are delightful. They’re just lovely.”

She adds, “I realized, as I began preparing the exhibition, just how lucky ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ has been to receive several significant collections of illustrated books,” holdings that go back to a collection of natural history and biology books from “Uncle Johnny” Stanton, a member of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ faculty from 1863 to 1906.

Other collections came from Arthur Peaslee, an 1890 ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ graduate whose donation of more than 100 books included many relating to the Italian poet Dante and his Divine Comedy; and from John Lovejoy ’58, whose gift reflected his interest in contemporary books from small presses.

Authors represented in Bound to Art include poet John Ashbery, adventure novelist Edgar Rice Burroughs, Chaucer, Coleridge, Dante, Frank O’ Hara, Ovid and Walt Whitman. Among the illustrators are Leonard Baskin, Gustave Doré and Marcel Duchamp. Maine artists, such as the late Martha Hall, are also represented.

One of the oldest books on display is a medical textbook from 1601 that shows the muscular structure of the larynx. “It made an incredible impact on the field of medicine,” says Stefko, “but it’s also regarded even today as one of the most beautiful medical textbooks ever published.”

Another highlight is Audubon’s Birds of America in the so-called Bien edition, named for its printer. This volume of stunning life-size prints is also called the “double elephant” edition, in reference to the paper size — about 30 by 40 inches — called by that term, which at one time was the largest that printers could accommodate.

Stefko also points to a four-volume set called The Poems, a 1960 collaboration between the New York School of poets and the second generation of Abstract Expressionist artists. Containing the only silkscreens that many of those artists ever made, the books were produced in a limited edition of 225 sets.

“To me, this is a great thing to be doing because so many people may not know that the Muskie Archives also possesses rare and fine-press books,” says museum director Dan Mills. “This exhibition will get the word out.”

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Stunning examples of the book illustrator’s art, including rare Abstract Expressionist silkscreens and life-size bird prints by John James Audubon.

A video series exploring the notion of dialogue.

Paintings by Will Barnet, Marsden Hartley, John Marin, Marguerite Zorach and other acclaimed artists associated with Maine.

These are a few of the temptations the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Museum of Art offers in exhibitions opening with a 6 p.m. reception on Friday, Jan. 14, and ending March 25.

The museum, located in the Olin Arts Center at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, 75 Russell St., is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. It is open to the public at no cost. For more information, please call 207-786-6158.

The shows are: , an eclectic review of book illustrations based on volumes from ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ collections;

, featuring artists from Amsterdam, Boston and New York;

and , representing a Maine museum devoted to American art and holding a superb assortment of works by Maine-related artists.

“Each of the three exhibitions is terrific in distinct ways, from the impressive overview of the archives’ holdings of illustrated books, to the important modernist works in the Ogunquit exhibition, to the profound and entertaining videos in the ‘Dialogue’ series,” says museum director Dan Mills.

“Together, they offer a quite extraordinary array of art spanning the centuries and a wide variety of media.”

Two 6 p.m. events related to the exhibitions are scheduled at the museum. On Thursday, Feb. 17: Dialogue video artist Rachel Perry Welty discusses her work.

And on Monday, March 7: Kat Stefko, director of the archives and curator of Bound to Art, leads an informal conversation about books in the exhibition.

Old meets new as Roger Bill (center) and Hedge Hall (between the Bill and Dana Chemistry) welcome the new dining Commons (top left).

With last fall’s opening of a 152-bed residence located on the old Rand Field, Roger Williams and Hedge halls were removed from the roster of student residences.

This spring, campus groups and architect JSA discussed the buildings’ rehabilitation as classroom and faculty space. On April 29, one group met to evaluate the Bill’s and Hedge’s overall historical and aesthetic relevance.

“You really can’t tell the early history of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ without Roger Bill,” offered Kat Stefko, director of the Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library.

Indeed, though the Bill had a rebel-with-a-keg reputation as a residence (see ), it was dedicated in 1895 as a home for Cobb Divinity School. Just as ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ was founded to educate Freewill Baptist youth, the divinity school, in turn, was intended primarily to educate Freewill Baptist ministers. It closed in 1908, a sign of eroding ties between ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and the denomination.

The chemistry building until the 1960s, Hedge has a more-storied architectural history than the Bill. Designed by leading Maine architect George Coombs (he also designed the Kora Shrine Temple next to Luiggi’s), Hedge’s pleasingly ornate style is Richardsonian Romanesque, named for architect Henry Hobson Richardson. Hedge compares favorably to Richardson’s Crane Library in Quincy, Mass., said Rebecca Corrie, Phillips Professor of Art and Visual Culture.

In designing new academic interiors, JSA will be guided in part by the informal, commingled nature of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½’ academic/social culture. Successful ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ spaces, such as those in the new residence and dining Commons, “weave together formal and informal learning,” as one planning document notes.

Or, as College librarian Gene Wiemers put it, “ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students like to socialize and study at the same time. They don’t see a distinction.”