The richly illustrated essays in Cabinet of Curiosities records the creative processes behind an installation designed by contemporary artist Mark Dion at the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum at the University of Minnesota, a collaboration of museum staff, students, and collection curators. Drawing from university collections, Dion and the curators chose seven hundred objects representative of the state’s history, ranging from a Bierstadt painting of Minnehaha Falls to Hubert Humphrey memorabilia, as well as objects that would have fascinated Renaissance viewers—such as mirrors and the world’s smallest plant—and arranged them into categories typical of Renaissance inquiry, such as the Underworld, the Sea, Humankind, and the Library. Together, the cabinets represented the university in miniature, just as their Renaissance precursors had attempted to represent microcosms of the world. Cabinet of Curiosities offers commentary on the ways in which collecting has undergirded the creation of knowledge within universities and in Western society. Colleen J. Sheehy is director of education at the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum and associate faculty in American studies and art history at the University of Minnesota. Published in cooperation with the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum

When a young woman's body is discovered in the summer of 1910 Vienna, the Inspector's wife is certain the figs found in her stomach during the autopsy are the clue to the identity of the murderer—for there are no fresh figs in Vienna at this time of year.

Welcome to a carnival unlike anything that you have ever read about, visited, or even imagined before. Here, before your very eyes, you will encounter bizarre, anomalous creatures of every conceivable (and inconceivable!) kind-a veritable menagerie of cryptozoological mysteries to dazzle and delight, tantalize and terrify. For this is Mirabilis-a realm of marvels, wonders, miracles...and monsters!

Peer through the shadows and see what you may. Was that scuttling horror a spider the size of a puppy? Did that fallen tree trunk suddenly sprout a pair of alligator jaws? Was that a living toad that leapt out of that split-asunder block of stone? Did those flowers abruptly put forth wings and fly away as tiny birds?

Behold Trunko, the hairy marine elephant-bear that supposedly battled whales off the coast of South Africa almost a century ago. Look around in every direction and witness the very last giant lemurs brought to you from the rainforests of Madagascar, the very same unicorn that was once encountered by Julius Caesar, dinosaur-sized crocodiles from the swamps of the Congo, the elephantine harpoon-tusked sukotyro of Sumatra, gargantuan prehistoric beavers resurrected in modern-day North America, illusive Germanic horned hares and elusive Liberian micro-squirrels, a giant sea snail with antlers and paws from the Sarmatian Sea and a veritable whale-fish from a forgotten Swedish lake, a vanished striped mystery steed from Iberia, enormous toothless freshwater sharks from South America, flying turtles from China and a hippoturtleox from Tibet, sea dragons and pseudo-pterodactyls, and the world's only known tusked megalopedus.

Let us not tarry even a moment longer. The miracles and marvels of Mirabilis await you impatiently inside, to scintillate, spellbind, and stultify your senses. So I bid you welcome, and pray that your visit to this carnival of cryptozoology and unnatural history will be entertaining...and not too perilous!

About the Author:
Born and still living in the West Midlands, England, Karl P.N. Shuker graduated from the University of Leeds with a Bachelor of Science (Honors) degree in pure zoology, and from the University of Birmingham with a Doctor of Philosophy degree in zoology and comparative physiology. He now works full-time as a freelance zoological consultant to the media, and as a prolific published writer. Shuker is currently the author of 19 books and hundreds of articles, principally on animal-related subjects, with an especial interest in cryptozoology and animal mythology, on which he is an internationally recognized authority, but also including a poetry volume. He is also the editor of the Journal of Cryptozoology, the world's only existing peer-reviewed scientific journal devoted to mystery animals. He is a Scientific Fellow of the prestigious Zoological Society of London, and a Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society. He is Cryptozoology Consultant to the Centre for Fortean Zoology, and is also a Member of the Society of Authors.

The shifting fortunes of San Francisco’s legendary Cliff House, from raucous seaside roadhouse to fanciful Victorian palace to world-renowned urban destination, are celebrated in this comprehensive illustrated history.

The story of San Francisco’s Cliff House begins in 1863 with a modest white clapboard building perched on a rocky promontory overlooking the Pacific. Little more than three decades later, following a devastating fire, visionary millionaire Adolph Sutro oversaw construction of an imposing Victorian edifice on the same site. His 1896 “gingerbread palace” drew everyone to its doorstep, from working-class families to the city’s social elite to three U.S. presidents. That grand structure withstood the great earthquake of 1906, but burned to the ground a year later. Sutro’s oldest daughter, Emma Sutro Merritt, immediately set to work on a new Cliff House, which opened in 1909.

In the century since then, the Cliff House has survived a handful of destructive storms, two major earthquakes, three nearby fires, two closures, several facelifts, the swinging sixties, the not-so-swinging seventies, and the often grindingly slow decisions of government. Despite these and other challenges, today’s Cliff House, now part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, is enjoying a renaissance following a two-year, multimillion-dollar restoration. This lavishly illustrated volume chronicles the fortunes of the legendary landmark and the people associated with it–a colorful story that parallels both the history and the irrepressible spirit of the city of San Francisco.

Jennifer Angus new series of site-specific installations reference the beauty of historical Victorian European ornament and its relationship to nature. Her all-over designs represent flora and fauna and create an ordered version of the wild through stylization and repetition. However by using over fifteen thousand pinned tropical insects of various forms, hues and sizes to create these patterns, Angus challenges the viewer s notion of attraction and repulsion, comfort and discomfort. Publication documenting a series of three exhibitions, at the Musée d art de Joliette, the Textile Museum of Canada and the Dennos Museum. In English and French.

What becomes of the Soul after death? is an eternal quest of man since time immemorial. Soul is immortal. Life on earth is halting place on the way to achievement of the goal of Life,God realization. Death is not the end of life but is a process of changing the instrument of experience. Birth is inevitably followed by death and death by rebirth. Life is a long chain,of which recurring births,planery lives and deaths are the links. Science about departed Souls and their planes of living is a subject of absorbiong interest. The other side of the death is scientifically examined and carefully described in this book of Swami Sivanananda Maharaj. It also gives an insight into different beliefs of various races and religions. The significance of different practices and customs in connection with the dead along with the beneficial effects of such oblations is explained in detail in the following chapters. Presentation of some of the rebirth cases along with a question and answer section makes an interesting reading. A careful study of the book will remove the veil of ignorance and the knowledge will make one free from horrors of death.