Everyone,
If the lines along the traditional art library and visual
resources professions are blurring due to changes in those professions
and the disciplines themselves-and they are-then real, productive
reciprocity to me means looking beyond mere affiliation, which doesn't
really get us much, or a joint conference, into the merging of both
organizations so members of both can benefit from a larger collective
body of expertise and programs without having to divide funds,
loyalties, volunteerism, and time between the two organizations and
end up in a pick-and-choose situation. Such a coming together within
one organization would even mimic the collaboration and joint
initiatives that most of us are seeing between people in libraries,
visual resources centers, information technology offices, new media
projects, museums, archives, etc.
I think Mark's term of "art information professional"
is key here. This isn't about books, or digital images, or serials, or
digital text, or digital video, or architecture, design, or visual
resources specialties. It's about effectively providing art
information to our patrons, no matter what the media interest,
administrative structure, educational background, or institutional
location of members.
One fact remains in all of this: ARLIS/NA and VRA are currently
distinct, separate, incorporated organizations, with separate budget
structures, separate governing processes, separate missions, different
goals, etc., but with some overlapping members and, occasionally,
colliding histories. In fact, it is this separateness that often makes
a joint conference so difficult. But none of this is insurmountable,
as many have already pointed out.
I find Gregg's last comment exceedingly relevant: "I believe
that if ARLIS and VRA do not merge, they will continue to lose
membership (or more basically, the interest of its members) to other
groups that better address their needs to grow and develop as art
information professionals in an age where libraries and our profession
is evolving so swiftly." There are many more interesting,
focused, educational, and appropriate venues to find continuing
professional development than there were twenty years ago.
As a long-time member of both organizations, I would heartily
support a joint task force to look at the issue of merging. This
discussion has been brewing for some time. We have one thing going in
both organizations' favor: ARLIS/NA-VRA joint task forces have all
been very productive and successful to date.
Do a group of us need to officially petition the Executive
Board?
Best,
John
I would second all of these points, and would add the
enormous financial burden faced by those of us who try to be active in
both organizations. This was always difficult, but it's now
becoming almost prohibitive. It is also ironic, in that we need
the interaction of our various constituencies more now than ever
before. We have so much to share with each other, as was amply
demonstrated at this year's SEI. But we seem to be two
organizational trains on two parallel tracks that rarely, if ever,
arrive at the same station.
Eileen Fry
Indiana University
From: ART LIBRARIES SOCIETY DISCUSSION LIST
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Mark Pompelia
Sent: Thursday, June 29, 2006 2:00 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARLIS-L] VRA & ARLIS
Maryly,
Susan Jane, and ARLIS Members,
I realize
that this addresses much larger issues, but I am amazed at how VRA &
ARLIS can have such close and normal relations at the local levels
regarding how our chapters interact but at the national levels we
cannot manage to have a joint conference more than once in twenty-five
years. I recognize that our associations do relate in other arenas
(SEI, joint sponsorships, shared position papers, etc.) but this
strikes me as a minimal cooperation, not one that recognizes that
anymore we are the same audience, drawing upon the same issues, the
same pool of volunteers, the same experts, etc.
I remain
impressed by Sherman Clarke's Distinguished Service Award in Banff
when it was clear how elegantly and effortlessly he has managed to
serve both associations, and all to our collective
benefit.
I have
personally felt for many years that ARLIS and VRA should enter into a
federation of sorts, one that preserves our individual strengths but
steers us toward our common goals as art information professionals, a
federation where a joint conference is the norm, not the unlikely. Yet
it happens year after year that we are no closer to such relations.
Why is this so? Is it that this relationship is not working, or is it
that this is the way this affiliation works? I do not have the
answers, but the questions have never been formally
asked.
Furthermore,
if the questions cannot be asked at the board levels (for whatever
reasons, but it goes beyond any one board or any one organization),
then as members we should seek answers under a member-driven
arrangement (petition? blog?). Is joint conference registration the
best we can do?
Thanks,
Mark
Mark Pompelia
Director, Visual Resources Center
Dept. of Art History
Rice
University
PO Box 1892, MS
21
Houston TX 77251-1892
Editor, VRA Bulletin
<http://www.vraweb.org/>
Past President, ARLIS Texas-Mexico Chapter
<http://www.arlis-txmx.org>
e: [log in to unmask]
p: 713-348-4836
f: 713-348-4039
URL: http://arthistory.rice.edu
At 12:12 PM
-0400 6/29/06, Susan Jane Williams wrote:
I agree with
Maryly.
I understand
that this opens an even more complex set of issues, but since the
ARLIS board and membership are going to reconsider Chapter issues, I
would strongly urge that they take a look at the important symbiosis
between VRA regional chapters and ARLIS chapters. I think we can do
much better than a conference discount in terms of real reciprocity at
this critical time of change in both the librarian and visual
resources professions.
Since Ann
has been president of VRA and is now president of ARLIS, I think she
has the background information necessary to help this process and
I would hope for a simple solution along the lines of a slightly more
expensive per meeting charge for "cross-over" attendance
(which would equal annual chapter dues if two meetings were attended).
I don't think the benefits of such interaction can be boiled down to
only revenue.
Best,
Susan
Susan Jane
Williams
Data
Specialist and User Services Liaison
Saskia Ltd./
Scholars Resource, Inc.
susanjane_williams@hotmailcom
or
[log in to unmask]
Cell: (203)
927-3640
-----
Original Message -----
Sent:
Wednesday, June 28, 2006 4:50 PM
Subject: Re:
[ARLIS-L] VRA & ARLIS
Maryly,
Members of
ARLIS/NA and VRA are affiliated and through that affiliation members
from both organizations receive the member discount at each
organization's conferences. This is the agreement between ARLIS/NA
and VRA.
Ann
Subject: [ARLIS-L]
VRA & ARLIS
Since ARLIS is affiliated
with VRA and because many of the ARLIS chapter members who are NOT
members of ARLIS/NA are dues-paying members of VRA, shouldn't they get
some reciprocal privileges?
Thanks,
Maryly
!DSPAM:44a4043423775021468!
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--
John J. Taormina
Director, Visual Resources Center
Dept. of Art, Art History & Visual Studies
Duke University
Box 90764
112 East Duke Building
Durham NC 27708-0764
Ph: 919-684-2501
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
http://www.duke.edu/web/art/
"The spice must flow."
-Frank Herbert,
Dune