----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, March 19, 2008 8:14 AM
Subject: RE: [ARLIS-L] cataloging auction catalogs
Hello
Joan,
I am a library student
hoping to work in museum and/or art libraries. I have found your book
Art Museum Libraries and Librarianship
very helpful as a resource in several of my
classes. In fact, we call it the art museum library “Bible” in our
special libraries class. I highly recommend it for other
students.
Kathy
Wellington
Dominican
Unversity
From: ART
LIBRARIES SOCIETY DISCUSSION LIST [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Joan Benedetti
Sent: Monday, March 17, 2008 11:52
AM
To:
[log in to unmask]
Subject:
Re: [ARLIS-L] cataloging auction catalogs
Have you seen the book, Art Museum Libraries and Librarianship,
published last year by Scarecrow Press? (www.scarecrowpress.com) It
includes an excellent article on all aspects of auction catalogs. The
essay's author, Jeffrey Weidman, firmly believes in the importance of art museum
libraries collecting auction catalogs and at the library where he works (the
Nelson-Atkins) they are able to subscribe to SCIPIO and do copy cataloging of
records in SCIPIO's cooperative database of auction catalogs. They
arrange their auction catalogs chronologically, as do many
libraries. Some libraries simply accession the catalogs as they come
in (so that they know that they've received them), put a property stamp on them,
and then shelve them chronologically. Some other libraries, however, have
decided to discard all auction catalogs but the last two or three years,
primarily because of the amount of space that they eventually
occupy.
The book referred to above includes essays on 16 general
areas of interest written specifically with art museum librarians (including
those who work in university art museums) in mind. If you don't have it, I
recommend it to you. Good luck!
Art Museum Libraries and
Librarianship
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday,
March 17, 2008 7:49 AM
Subject: Re:
[ARLIS-L] cataloging auction catalogs
Lois, That is a good question. The staff and
director want them cataloged, so I think that is the direction we are headed,
but we do need to consider time and expense. I think many of the
approaches mentioned in answer to my post would be good to consider, so I
think that at the end of the week I will collect them all together and present
them to the staff to discuss.
Thanks for all of the responses and
advice,
Judy, Do you really want to catalog all your
auction catalogs? Will it be worth the time and expense? At the Wichita Art Museum I shelve them by date, so
if someone asks if we have Christy's American paintings... of such and such
a date, I can just look on the shelves. I DO catalog a few that are
restricted to a particular artist or painting. And only those devoted to a
personal collection are cataloged if they are limited to a certain artist,
such as Joe Blow's collection of Andy Warhol paintings. It seems to satisfy
our needs. There are databases out there that can search for more general
topics/auction houses/works of art, but we can't afford them, and if
necessary, a reference librarian at the Nelson Atkins Museum in Kansas City has offered to do a search for
me. I've very rarely had to call on him for that. Let me know if you have
any questions.
-----Original
Message-----
From: Judith Gustafson
<[log in to unmask]>Sent:
Mar 15, 2008 2:49 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [ARLIS-L]
cataloging auction catalogs
I am a library student volunteering at Loyola
University Museum of Art in Chicago in helping to set up their
library (Solomon Cordwell Buenz Sacred Art and Architecture
Library). We are about to begin cataloging our auction catalogs and
I would like to find out how other libraries arrange their auction
catalogs. It seems that a couple libraries that I know of
catalog by auction date, but does anyone do it by
subject matter? One of the staff people here would like to have
them arranged by subject (e.g. all Old Master Paintings together, etc.),
which I am not sure would be practical. Any
advise?
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