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Has anyone on the list ever attempted to reclassify monographs from LC
or Dewey to a new system so that all the works about a particular artist
are shelved together without any regard to artistic medium? I have asked
to explore this by the curator of the contemporary art library where I
freelance catalog, the Swiss Institute. The curator does not like all
the scattering of works by medium. We use DDC and identify monographic
materials with a light blue band.

The number of monographs under consideration is approximately 1000
items. Although attempts have been made to classify under one call
number all the works of a particular artist, we have not be consistent
and have not documented our efforts.

The curator does not like using the online catalog and does not want to
get involved in how Dewey works. She has suggested arranging,
alphabetically by name of artist, the monographic materials in document
boxes. This would provide very quick and easy access.

The art librarians I have spoken to all in varying degrees felt that
this scenario wasn't good both in terms of labor in reclassifying and in
terms of integrity of the collection. One very good suggestion I
received was to maintain Dewey but to document in a classification
authority list each artist's call number. Rather than attempting to
reclassify the collection, updating would be done on the fly.

Any help or comments? Please reply offlist.

Monica Berger
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