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Poly Archives & Special Collections

Guide to the collections in the Poly Archives at Bern Dibner Library, New York University.

Student Curator Joel Ureña

2021

Tandon student Joel Ureña's ('20) project, The Polywog Collection, was featured in the Sept/Oct 2020 issue of Archival Outlook magazine.  We look forward to returning to campus in Fall 2021 and welcoming more students into our archives.  We can't wait to see what you discover & create!

A photograph of the Archival Outlook magazine's September/October 2020 issue cover published by the Society of American Archivists. The cover depicts white apparel in four colored boxes, all separate pieces from Ureña’s project. In the upper section (from left to right) is ‘Protestor, 1970’ (A t-shirt inside of a red box. On the shirt is an image of a student with a sign that says “Don’t Be A “Good German” Don’t Go To Work or Classes Today”) and ‘the Poet, 1968’ (A hooded sweatshirt in an orange box. On the hoodie is an image of a student with glasses reading a box, written at the bottom of the image is “Poets-well known and obscure”). In the bottom section (from left to right) is ‘the Engineers, 1976-1989’ (A crewneck sweater inside of a yellow box. On the sweater is a collage of black and white images of NYU Tandon School of Engineering students, written at the bottom of the design is “Engineers”.) and ‘Ramon-Counterweight, 1969’ (A blue box with a crewneck sweater. On the sweater is an image of Ramon Mosterio, the Editor-in-chief of Counterweight, wearing a hat, a turtle neck, and a dark jacket and pants, holding a cigarette in their mouth. The person seems to be sitting with one leg crossed and is balancing three beverages. Written at the bottom of the design is “Counterweight,” repeated three times in descending order.) Also on the cover at the bottom is a navigation section for the rest of the magazine (written as “7 Documenting Oral Histories of COVID-19”, “12 ARCHIVES RECORDS 2020 Goes Virtual”, and “14 Celebrating SAA Award Winners and Fellows.”)

Archival Outlook magazine cover   

 

              A screenshot of 'the Polywog Collection' website created by Joel Ureña. The screenshot shows a black background with several images of Black and Latinx NYU Tandon School of Engineering students at the top of the page. On the actual site, the photographs are moving towards the bottom in an aimless manner. In the middle of the website is the title ‘the Polywog Collection’ and description, written as such: “A line of campus apparel, inspired by black and latinx engineering students.~Images sourced from NYU Poly Archives (1887-2009)~”. At the very bottom is a down arrow that, when pressed, sends you to Ureña’s project.                              Screenshot of Joel's website, The Polywog Collection

 

More about this project:

Tandon feature story "A Deep Dive in the Archives Results in a Diversity-Focused Clothing Line"

NYU Libraries feature story "Inspired by Archives, Tandon Grad Celebrates Early Black Engineers in His Own Fashion" 

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