An exploration of women and water in the history of Niagara’s visual culture is the focus of a new Brock Library exhibit on display until Thursday, March 28.

“Women, Water and Words: an Exploration of Visual Culture in Niagara” showcases a broad range of material connected by the focus of visual culture in Niagara, including whimsical sketches, advertisements, tourist materials and photographs of architectural monuments.

Each of the artifacts on display in the Learning Commons and Thistle corridor cases was chosen from the Library’s Archives and Special Collections by one of 16 Visual Arts students in a second-year course on 19th-century visual culture.

Working in partnership with Archives and Special Collections since the beginning of Winter Term, students researched their selected artifact and created an accompanying summary for the class web page.

“In some cases, the connection to women might not be immediately obvious from the image, but for many pieces, the research links back to a story about a woman,” says Department of Visual Arts Professor Keri Cronin.

Second-year Visual Culture student Natalia Rodrigues has a passion for geography and archeology. She selected a late 1800s Drope family tintype photograph from the William Henry Nelles Hull Family Fonds for her project.

“I chose this artifact not only because I love the way it looks, but also because women are not represented as often as men in many studies from this time period,” says Rodrigues. “To me, it is a unique representation of something we don’t often see in history.”