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Dear Colleagues:
Our Dept. Chair just told me about a discussion one of the other faculty
members had this morning with an undergrad who is a joint major in aryt
history and information science. The faculty member was encouraging the
student to look at job ads in our fields. The student's response was that
she is being told by people NOT to look at such ads because there is NO
future in our fields!!
The future of our discipline is very much on my mind in recent years for
several reasons: the greying of our organization, the FEW courses offered
in library schools in art librarianship, what I perceive to be the slow
growth of ARLIS/NA membership, the continuing development of digitized
image projects.
I am working on draft three of a course proposal that I will soon present
to the Library Science Department at the University of Pgh. Is anyone
else out there doing something similiar? It will be team taught with the
Department's Slide Curator, Dan Nolting and we plan to bring in guest
speakers such as Jennifer Trant (AMICO) and other experts. We plan to
have internships in local art libraries and tours to regional art
libraries.
Is any one out there working on new texts in our field? AART LIBRARIES
AND INFORMATION SERVICES by Lois Jones and Sally Gibson is now 13 years
old! I think our organization needs to be pro-active about the education
of future art librarians / visual resource managers. We need to take
action! We need to do it now! How should this challenge be addressed?
I am working on a conference proposal for the 2001 ARLIS conference in LA
on this subject. Let the discussion begin now via ARLIS-L.
Ray Anne
Ray Anne Lockard
Head, Frick Fine Arts Library
University Library System
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, PA 15260
Voice: 412-648-2410
Fax: 412-648-7568
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
A book should be a ball of light in one's hands.
Ezra Pound
