Dear Colleagues,
I am proud to announce that later this month, the Frances Mulhall Achilles Library will launch electronic finding aids for segments of the processed archival collections on the Museum website (www.whitney.org).
In 2011, the Henry Luce Foundation awarded an American Art Renewal Fund (AARF) grant of $195,000 to the Whitney Museum of American Art to support staffing in the Museum's Frances Mulhall Achilles Library. These funds provided multi-year
support which allowed for the restoration of a senior library assistant position and the addition of a part-time archivist.
The Whitney's archival collections contain over two thousand linear feet of original records from Museum departments, consisting of correspondence, loan agreements, exhibition plans, publicity, exhibition photos, media formats and ephemera
that relate directly to the artists and personalities who have made key contributions to the Museum and its program since its founding in 1930. By bolstering the Library's operations through increased staffing and by supporting its research and archival processing
functions, the AARF grant has made possible concrete outcomes such as instituting Archivists' Toolkit and oXygen XML Editor for creating standardized EAD finding aids. The project archivist also created a workflow for future processing and description that
accounts for the small archives staff while maintaining library and archival standards.
The Henry Luce Foundation has a long and illustrious history of championing and broadening knowledge about American art through its grant making activity. On behalf of the Frances Mulhall Achilles Library and the Whitney Museum of American
Art, we are profoundly grateful to the Foundation for their ongoing and generous support.
Carol Rusk
Benjamin and Irma Weiss Librarian
Frances Mulhall Achilles Library
Location:
610 West 26th Street, 8th floor
Mailing address:
Whitney Museum of American Art
945 Madison Avenue
New York, NY 10021