Short Introduction

The American Geographical Society Library has been in existence since the late 1850s and has been located at the University of Milwaukee since 1978.

The library's focal collections are maps, charts and instruments. However, it also has a notable Muybridge collection including 54 mammoth size prints of Yosemite, and a Panorama of San Francisco from California Street Hill, 1878.

Further Muybridge related collections items may be available; please contact the librarian for more information.

Past Exhibitions

Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI Title of show: “Charting a New Frontier: the American Geographical Society Collection of Nineteenth-Century American Photography” Dates of show: 27th May - 18th September 1988, featured 7 Muybridge photographs from AGSL collections.

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Art History Gallery, Milwaukee, WI. Title of show: “Eadweard Muybridge: Yosemite Photographs” Dates of show: 21 Sept.-23 Oct. 1994, featured 30 Muybridge photographs from AGSL.

Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI Title of show: “American Landscape Photography” Dates of show: 10 May-1 Sept. 1996 used 5 Muybridge photographs from AGSL.

Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee Title of show: “Masterpieces of Photography” Dates of show: 4 May-26 August 2001 used 2 Muybridge photographs from AGSL.

Brigham Young University Museum of Art, Provo, UT Title of show: “Photography and Perception: Exploring the Western Landscape” Dates of show: 6 Dec. 2001-4 May 2002 used 2 Muybridge photographs from AGSL

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Art History Gallery, Milwaukee, WI Title of show: “Building a National Identity: Photographs of the Western Frontier, 1860-1880” Dates of show: 12-26 May 2002 used 3 Muybridge photographs from AGSL.

J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA Title of show: “Dialogue Among Giants: Carleton Watkins and the Rise of Photography in California” Dates of show: 14 Oct. 2008-1 March 2009 used 5 Muybridge photographs from AGSL.

Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC Title of show: “Helios: Eadweard Muybridge in a Time of Change” Dates of show: 10 April-18 July 2010 used 6 Muybridge photographs from AGSL NOTE: this show will also travel to Tate Britain, London, UK, 13 Sept. 2010-16 Jan. 2011 and to Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA, 26 Feb.-7 June 2011.

Rights & Reproduction Information

All materials as widely available as possible but subject to certain rules as a result of their rarity, and also subject to a small fee.

For a complete list of policies and regulations, as well as cost fees, please refer to the library website. More Information

Online Presence

AGSL Digital Collections Portal

Collection Items:

Photographic Material

Prints: 55