“Hand in Hand” is the inaugural issue of Manual. The phrase was first recorded in the 16th century, and early usage described the clasping of palm to palm, but the term has since come to encompass more than this literal meaning. To be hand in hand is also to be connected, joined, concurrent, well matched. Thumb through this issue to find rigorous, imaginative musings as artists and academics make solid contact, gesture wildly, and put their fingers on the pulse of new ideas.

From the Files

Curator Elizabeth Williams pries open the archive to reveal Gorham Manufacturing Company’s production designs

Double Takes

Double Take looks at a medieval ivory diptych from the points of view of illustrator Robert Brinkerhoff and art historian Sheila Bonde

Object Lessons

Curator Maureen C. O’Brien exposes John Singleton Copley’s portraits of Moses Gill and his wives

Portfolio

 Loose linkages and clear couplings on the theme “hand in hand”

How To

Bauhaus artist Gunta Stölzl’s proposal for a double-weave textile as described by curator Kate Irvin.

Artists on Art

Cartoonist James McShane traipses through the entanglements of the intaglio printing process