Visual Resources Association
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2022 State of the Visual Resources Association Address
No full textDuring the dual remote and in-person 2022 Annual Business Meeting at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, the president highlighted the accomplishments and challenges of the Association in a state of the association presentation. This article provides the transcript
Uncovering Connections:: CAQDAS and Tropy for Art Historians and Archaeologists
No full textThis article reports on a 2021 study that aimed to assess art historians’ and archaeologists’ familiarity with computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software (CAQDAS), so that academic librarians and visual resources professionals could begin to consider if access to and instruction on these tools might benefit their patrons in these disciplines. Initial findings from the study were presented at the Visual Resources Association 2022 Annual Conference. Scholarship concerning the information organization needs and practices of material culture researchers is limited but growing. Self-identified art historians, archaeologists, and object-based and material culture researchers were invited to take a survey disseminated through convenience and snowball sampling. Responses revealed a lack of participant knowledge about CAQDAS and mixed opinions about their utility. The participants’ research needs demonstrated that art historians and archaeologists interested in CAQDAS should be advised to use them for their original intended purpose: that is, as an analysis aid that helps discover patterns within medium-to-large, sometimes mixed media, datasets. CAQDAS should not be recommended as a replacement for standardized databases, and knowledge management applications like Tropy better fit the need for personal image management support. For patient and motivated researchers with digital experience, CAQDAS can be a powerful tool. For others who fare well with more traditional analog and digital methods of analysis and organization, the packages may cause more frustration than success due to substantial learning curves and financial cost
Review of "Metadata Best Practices for Trans and Gender Diverse Resources"
No full textThe Metadata Best Practices for Trans and Gender Diverse Resources is a set of best practices written by the Trans Metadata Collective for describing, cataloging, and classifying information resources about trans and gender diverse people. The document serves as a resource for workers in cultural heritage institutions who create metadata about trans and gender diverse people. This review explores the Collective's efforts to develop an accessible best practices guide that positions users’ humanity before machine operability
Slides as Artifacts of Nostalgia: Personal and Professional Ruminations
No full textThe digital revolution is generally perceived to have made 35mm slides obsolete, but somehow along the way, a shift has begun to transform what was viewed as old and defunct to trendy and nostalgic. In this article, I ponder how obsolete physical media, or contemporary substitutions, can disrupt our habitation in the increasingly digital world and bridge our longing for a past remembered or imagined and our desire to instill authenticity in our current moment
Deep Dives into Digital Cultural Heritage Practices:: An Interview with Diane Zorich
No full textIn this interview, Diane Zorich (Director of the Digitization Program Office (DPO) at the Smithsonian Institution) brings her extensive knowledge and experience to consider approaches to working within cultural heritage institutions and what she would like to see moving forward. Notable topics discussed include sustainability in digital collections, inclusion, diversity, equity, and access initiatives, linked open data, NFTs, and sharing content on digital platforms outside of institutional control. Woven through the technological components, Zorich reflects on “materiality” and role of an object as a “touchstone for history, memory, and personal stories.
Copyright Management by Design
No full textRights management can be a convoluted aspect of comprehensive collection management that all cultural institutions must consider. From activities and projects to strategy and advocacy, implementing and maintaining proper copyright policies within your organization is mandatory. With information resources and best practices coming from a plethora of sources, consolidating this information into usable documentation can be difficult. Copyright law is also continuously evolving with new precedents and case studies emerging and challenging previous norms. Those who work with copyright on a regular basis have go-to resources such as fair use checklists, Hirtle’s Copyright Term and the Public Domain chart, U.S. Code: Title 17, etc. Newly published, The Copyright Management Guidelines for Cultural Heritage Institutions will be the next addition to this list of ready reference materials. From Europeana’s Copyright Committee, this guide shares streamlined and easy-to-use best practices for copyright management in cultural institutions. Both the concise writing and the infographic-like execution of the document are designed to take the guesswork out of copyright management. Practitioners can utilize the step-by-step guide in whole or in part, selecting the advice they require. However, utilizing all the goals and phases of this document will enable you to reach the ultimate goal of “[Harmonising] all approaches to copyright across your organisation.” These guidelines are designed to enable practitioners to visualize and conceptualize the copyright management process holistically. Having a proper foundation in place will enable the expansion of an organization's copyright program into a mature set of policies and practices, allowing for the integration of copyright into all relevant aspects of collection management
VRAB Volume 37, Issue 3: VRA Twenty-Eighth Annual Conference, Parts I & II
No full textThis issue features over 100 pages, including:
Association News
2010 Annual Conference Reports and Awards
Professional News
2010 Southeast College Art Conference (SECAC) VRC Session: United We Stand: Forging Partnerships in Support of the Digital Classroom
2010 Southeast College Art Conference (SECAC): Geographic Divide and Pedagogical Shift: A Re-Examination of Wölffinian Methodologies in Art History
2010 College Art Association (CAA): VRA-Sponsored Session: Academic Image Collections in Transition: Saving the Baby while Repurposing the Bath Water
VRA 28th Annual Conference
Opening Plenary Session: Peter Brantley, The Internet Archive
Session 1: Utilizing Blogs to Improve and Market Resources
Session 2: Staying Alive: Strategies for Dealing with Change and Increasing Professional Viability
Session 3: Transition to Learning Spaces: Redefining Our Space for the Digital World
Session 4: By the Numbers, Gathering and Using Statistics
Session 5: After the Transition: Planning for Collections Storage and Workspace Changes in the Digital Environment
Session 7: Engaging New Technologies, Part 1
Session 8: Life on the Other Side of the Pond, VR Activity in Europe
Session 9: Engaging New Technologies, Part 2
Session 11: Instruction 101
Session 12: Embedded Metadata: Share, Deliver, Preserve
Closing Plenary Session: Collections of Distinction: Adding Value to the Online Community of Visual Resource
Rally Help for a Small Archive: Matching Student and Volunteer Needs with Collections Management Priorities
No full textThis paper explores various ways that students and volunteers have been recruited and matched with rewarding projects in artist and architecture archives at the University of Hawaii's Hamilton Library. In small archives there are so many competing demands for solo archivists that some may shy away from what seems like additional effort to find and direct the work of others. Just a few hours a week can make a huge difference when you have the right people lined up. Consider all the small things that we can never find the time to do, or things that distract from more complex tasks. Having students and volunteers presents more structure to prioritize projects. Assignments that match their skills and interests can reward them with the experience or personal fulfillment that they are seeking, while benefitting the archivist and improving collections stewardship. Visual resource collections are positioned to attract amazing talent
"Can You Hear Me Okay?": Launching a Story-Based Archive Collection During COVID-19
No full textThe COVID-19 pandemic, racial reckoning across the United States, and the uncertainty of the future dramatically shaped the development of the UNC Story Archive collection. Formerly envisioned as a mobile recording studio that would travel to events to collect the stories of University of North Carolina alumni and students who are part of communities that have been misrepresented, ignored, or outright silenced in the historic record, a shift to entirely remote space had to happen. While considering how to rework the planning for this collection during Summer 2020, important questions about proceeding mindfully during crises arose. This article discusses how building the UNC Story Archive on intentional theoretical frameworks of collaboration, radical empathy, and honoring of space facilitated that shift and helped navigate those challenging questions. 
Visual Resources Association Treasurer's 2021 Report
No full textThe 2021 Treasurer's Report was presented at the remote 2021 Annual Business Meeting at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association. It outlines the previous year's budget activity as well as steps taken to secure the Visual Resources Association's investments and financial future. This article provides the transcript