I am all for closer relations between the two organizations. Before any
serious talk of mergers, however, I think at least another couple joint
conferences would be in order, to ensure that the two cultures both can
preserve everything they want and complete their respective agendas
within such a framework. If it works well, then why not merge? It
would be great for people like me who are members of both organizations,
but can only go to one conference a year.
Regarding the term "Visual Culture", I would have to take a dissenting
view here. That term was all the rage among art history departments in
the late '80s-early '90s. While they all considered changing their
names (and some did), it was never clear how this was reflected in the
discipline or curriculum. I think it is always good to have titles
whose meanings can be readily understood by the laity, and I don't think
this one can. As the bulk of us are still in museum or academic art or
architecture libraries and departments, I rather like having the terms
"art", "libraries" and "visual resources" in our title. A professional
organization should work to improve society-at-large's image of
librarians and VR professionals-we shouldn't change are name to convince
people we are on the cutting edge-rather we should be on the cutting
edge to show people what our titles mean!
I do think this discussion is very healthy!
Eric Wolf
Director of the Library
New York School of Interior Design
170 E. 70th Street
New York, NY 10021
212-472-1500 x216
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