PELLA — Central College welcomes Ian Boyden to campus Thursday, Nov. 10. He will speak at a convocation at 11 a.m. in Cox-Snow Recital Hall. His lecture, “From Dust to Rust: Reading an Iron Meteorite,” examines the implications of making a book out of an iron meteorite. He explores iron in many ways: from its elemental production in supergiant stars to its function in our blood; from its use as tools to its celebration as a religious object. Throughout, Boyden presents surprising and marvelous photographs of meteorites, images from observatories and images of his own meteorite books.
Boyden studied in China and Japan, eventually receiving degrees in the history of art from Wesleyan University and Yale University. He founded Crab Quill Press in 1998 and served as the director of the Sheehan Gallery at Whitman College from 1998 to 2007. His work has been hailed as simultaneously geological and lyrical, industrial and mystical, dreamlike and archetypal and has been exhibited in many public collections, including Reed College, Stanford University, the Portland Art Museum and the rare book room of Suzhou University.