2003 Visual Arts Libraries survey

This survey was conducted by the National Library, with assistance from ARLIS/ANZ, to provide background information for the Visual Arts Forum which was held in 2004.

Survey Results

Respondents
37 organisations responded to the survey. Disappointingly, not all of the state libraries approached responded to the survey, and not all state galleries sent in a response. A good range of academic visual arts libraries responded, and a number of smaller galleries, both public and private. In two cases, smaller galleries responded only to say that their "library" was small, had no professional staff, and was for use by gallery staff only.

Although we expect most respondents would not object to their responses being made public, this public version of the results does not in general identify specific libraries, although some larger libraries are named where it seemed appropriate.

Users of visual arts libraries
Most respondents indicated that their major user groups were their own staff and students, however large public institutions such as the State Library of New South Wales and the National Library have a very large potential user base made up of members of the public and researchers.

User group identified by responding library Number of libraries identifying this as a user group
Staff 27
Students 25
Volunteer guides 5
Members of the public 17
Researchers 10

Other user groups mentioned in responses include art dealers, gallery members, independent scholars, government bodies and special researcher groups such as genealogists.

Size of user population
Libraries serving whole communities counted the total population as potential users. Actual user numbers ranged up to 2,000 regular users at one educational institution, while some libraries of small galleries serve only a small number of onsite staff. Many thousands of people visit the research libraries of some larger public institutions each year.

Collections
The major collections identified in the survey are those of state galleries and other cultural institutions. In some cases collection statistics and detailed collection information are available on the institution's site. Some large institutions are not in a position to estimate with any accuracy the proportion of the total collection which is visual arts- related.

Monographs
Some regional galleries report monograph holdings of only a few hundred volumes. The largest monograph collection in an arts-specific institution was that at the National Gallery of Australia (125,000 volumes). A further 9 institutions identified visual arts collections of 30,000 or more monographs.

Journals
Most libraries reported no holdings of electronic journals, apart from those which are part of major library systems such as universities or state libraries, where large numbers of electronic titles are subscribed to on an institution-wide basis.
Print journal holdings were quite extensive in some cases, with 12 libraries reporting over 500 titles (although some of these are general, not subject-specific, collections), and a further seven holding 101-500 journals. Art libraries within universities or major galleries reported the largest journal holdings of art-related titles.

Number of journal titles Number of libraries reporting holdings
0 or no response 5
1-50 6
51-100 6
101-500 7
501 + 12

Photographs
Five collections of over 100,000 photographs were reported. These include the collections of the National Library, the State Library of New South Wales, and the Australian War Memorial.
The majority of respondents did not have photographic collections, and several others hold photographs but do not have a count of because they are only held as part other collections such as ephemera.

Digital images
Only 11 libraries have any digital image collections, and of these only the Australian War Memorial, the State Library of New South Wales and the National Library had over 10,000 images. Such collections are not always within the library within an institution - they may be held in an academic department within a university, or in a library separate from main library.

Slides
A number of libraries have extensive slide collections. In all, 17 of the responding institutions have slide collections, and as with digital images, the collections are sometimes outside the library. Six institutions reported slide collections of over 50,000 items.

Film/video
All but five respondents had some film and/or video in their collections, although the majority of the collections are quite small. The majority of collections (17) contain less than 1,000 titles. Only Film Australia, the State Library of New South Wales, and the National Library reported collections of over 5,000 film/video items.

Other collections, including guerilla resources
Original art works or prints are held in a number of institutions. Manuscript collections in institutions such as major libraries include some collections of relevance to the visual arts, and the National Gallery of Australia has a very significant archive collection (150 shelf metres). Some libraries hold very extensive collections of guerrilla resources, including sales and exhibition catalogues (14 libraries), biography files (nine libraries) and press clippings (11 libraries). Some libraries estimate their ephemera collections contain over a million items.

Access
While many libraries have public catalogue access to their monograph and serial collections, access to more ephemeral material is problematic. In many cases guerilla resources are accessible only by physical access to the collections. This usually means they are organised alphabetically by artist or other subject. Printed or online lists of items in the grey literature collections are uncommon. Those libraries which are part of major institutions often have their monograph and serial collections fully catalogued, but ephemera is catalogued only at collection level if at all. There are a variety of ad-hoc arrangements in place also - one library reports retrieval by "ISYS text retrieval across Word documents" and another major library indicates that while some material is on RAAM, there are no staff to continue the work, and volunteers are doing some listings.
Just over half the respondents would like to increase the levels of use of their guerilla collections. Libraries which do not want to encourage access are those which operate for the use of staff only, or are not "public" libraries. There are a variety of reasons why libraries are reluctant to encourage more use of materials, apart from general access policies. These include security concerns, a lack of space for visitors, a lack of staff resources, damage to items in the past and copyright.

Australian visual arts databases
ARTEX (NGA) is made available by Discovery Media's subscription AVAD service. The AustArt database is freely available through the COFA site, but few people know about it. Some other databases constructed by art libraries are for internal use only.

Subject areas represented in responding libraries
The list below indicates those subject areas specifically named in survey responses. It is by no means a comprehensive list of the subjects covered in all responding libraries, and the areas overlap, being a combination of format and subject. Some libraries simply indicated that they had "all" subjects.

Subject area No. of libraries Subject area No. of libraries
Aboriginal art 3 Fine arts 11
Antiquities 1 Furniture 2
Architecture 4 Glass 2
Art education 1 Graphic arts 2
Art history 2 Jewellery 1
Art theory 3 Local/family history 1
Artists 1 Maritime history 1
Asian art 1 Media arts 1
Australian art 2 Metalwork 1
Ceramics 3 Military 1
Contemporary art 2 Ocenaia 1
Craft arts 4 Painting 4
Dance 3 Photography 12
Decorative arts 4 Performing arts 1
Design 8 Printmaking 4
Digital art 1 Prints 1
Drama 1 Sculpture 6
Drawings 1 Textiles 3
European art 1 Tribal art 1
Fashion 2 TV/broadcasting 1
Film 2 Wood 1

Comments on significant items not accessible
A small number of respondents commented on known collections which are not readily accessible. It was noted that some early Australian databases in the field are no longer available, such as AARTI (National Gallery of Australia, database ceased 1985) and Artsdoc (Australia Council, database ceased 1988). The Trendall collection at Latrobe University, which is not held in the Library nor represented in the Latrobe Library catalogue, is an example of a major collection which is not widely accessible. The collection, of over 9,000 monographs and other materials, is not available for loan, under the conditions of the bequest to the University (the collection is housed in the A. D. Trendall Research Centre for Ancient Mediterranean Studies, and is only accessible to honours and postgraduate students and staff). See http://www.latrobe.edu.au/trendall/library.htm for details and catalogue access.

Several libraries commented that the collections in state gallery libraries should all be listed in the National Bibliographic Database, because these are valuable public collections which are often not well known nor easily accessible.

Participation in the Australian Libraries Gateway

Entry in ALG Number
Yes 25
No 7
No response 4

Most of the organisations not represented in ALG are smaller local galleries, and a number of these said they were not aware of ALG.
16 libraries indicated that they have updated their ALG entries within the last 12 months. 12 libraries have not updated their entry, and the remainder did not indicate if their entry has been updated. Ten libraries have included information about subject collecting levels in their ALG entries. 11 libraries include collection highlights in their ALG entries.Usefulness of Australian Libraries Gateway 13 libraries commented that ALG was a useful tool.

In particular, there were comments about the usefulness of the digitisation pages, contact details for libraries, and the links to web catalogues.
Comments include:
"a widely used and valuable resource"
"excellent"
"use it frequently"
"useful if the entries are up to date"

There were also comments about desired improvements to ALG. These include requests for:

  • Keyword searching of all fields (2 responses asked for this)
  • Improved / clearer terminology
  • More information on guerilla resources
  • Ability to search on the name of library system used
  • Boolean search on all fields
  • Improved subject search (3 responses
  • Simpler editing

Bibliographic control of collections

% of collection catalogued or listed Number of responses
100 6
80-99 11
50-79 1
All except ephemera / guerilla collections 11
Most of collection uncatalogued / unlisted 2
No response 5

It is common for guerilla collections to be uncatalogued. A number of the libraries reporting a high level of bibliographic control of their collections qualified their response with a note that ephemera is uncatalogued.

Automated library systems
All but 12 libraries responding to the survey have an automated library system. Systems in use include:

System Number of responses
Advance 1
Alice 1
DB/Textworks 2
Dynix 3
ExLibris 2
First 2
Horizon 3
inhouse 1
Innopac 3
MetaMARC 1
Spydus 1
UNICORN 1
Virtua 1
Voyager 2

Those libraries without library systems were all smaller local or regional galleries.

Quite a number of libraries also have supplementary systems or methods for maintaining control over parts of their collections. These include:
Card catalogues
Filemaker Pro
DB/Textworks
MySQL
AWAIRS
and some inhouse systems

Cataloguing standards
The use of MARC and AACR2 is common, and 21 libraries mentioned these standards. A small number of respondents mentioned DDC, Dublin Core or specialised subject headings.

Six libraries reported that they make some use of the Australian Pictorial Thesaurus, although only two of these use it for subject headings in their catalogue.

Online catalogue availability
21 libraries make their catalogue available over the Internet, while five reported that it is available online only within their institutions. The remaining libraries do not have an online catalogue.

Participation in the National Bibliographic Database and Interlibrary loans
NBD
17 respondents add data to the NBD, 11 do not, and eight did not respond to this question.
Those not participating in the NBD indicate that cost (three responses) and insufficient staff resources (seven responses) are the major reasons, although two also believed that it was unnecessary because they hold no unique materials. Two libraries are concerned about possible interlibrary loan workloads. Interlibrary loans 24 libraries provide interlibrary loans. The libraries not providing ILL cite limited staff resources, or a lack of demand for ILL, as the reasons. Three libraries did not respond. Three of those providing ILLs do so almost exclusively to other TAFE libraries, but most others have no restrictions on ILL, although pictorial material is generally not lent except for exhibition purposes. Only 11 of the respondents use the Kinetica Document Delivery system.
Seven respondents report that interlibrary loans are increasing, while ten others have seen no change in the level of ILL over recent years. Only the National Library reported a decreasing level of ILL, although the State Library of NSW reports that traffic is now steady after a period of decline.

Use of databases

Australian databases

Database Number of responses reporting use
APAIS 15
AustArt 12
AVAD 7
AUSTROM (compilation) 2
AMOL 3
APAFT 4
HERA 2
NATSIVAD 2

A wide variety of other databases are mentioned by single respondents. These include: RAAM, NATSIVAD, Australian Education Index, ACMI and ARCH.

11 libraries did not answer this question, and three said they do not use online databases. In several cases cost was mentioned as the reason for not accessing online databases, apart from those available at no charge.

Overseas databases

Database Number of responses reporting use
Art Abstracts 6
Art Bibliographies Modern 9
Bibliography of the History of Art 6
Grove Dictionary of Art 5
AMICO 2
Design and Applied Arts Index 7

Other overseas databases mentioned include general indexes such as ABI Inform and Expanded Academic Index, as well as specialist files such as auction house sites and the International Index of the Performing Arts, and a variety of art price and auction databases.

12 libraries indicated that the cost of some overseas databases means they are unable to make use of such resources. The Grove Dictionary of Art was named by some respondents, as was the Art Full Text file. Some libraries have no funds for overseas database access, and even libraries in large institutions report that cost limits their access to overseas databases. 15 libraries indicated an interest in joining a consortium to negotiate database access, although participation would depend on the cost.

There were no suggestions for titles of Australian art journals to be indexed in online databases. A single respondent mentioned Encore magazine, which is a film industry title (a very limited number of articles from Encore are indexed in APAIS), and another respondent expressed interest in Ceramics Technical. Respondents also suggested that newspaper indexing needed attention, and that more retrospective indexing of journals already indexed would be useful.

Other online resources
Other online resources used by survey respondents include online image collections, full text journals, publishers' sites, booksellers' sites, tables of contents services and dictionaries and maps. One library made suggestions about some reference titles which would be useful online resources. 25 libraries reported they do not encounter difficulties in accessing online resources. The most common complaint among other respondents was the poor quality of some online images, and software/hardware problems.

AustArt indexing
22 libraries are not in a position to assist with AustArt indexing, with some of those noting that the reason is staff shortages. Only two libraries responded with actual suggestions for journals they may be able to index for the database.

Six libraries indicated that might be able to offer some assistance, but one of those noted that they are short-staffed anyway so unable to see what help they can provide. Eight respondents did not answer this question.

Resource sharing
Ten libraries indicated they have resources they would like to be able to share, although at this stage are unable to do so because of a lack of resources (staff, appropriate software, funds). These include indexes to specific journals, and other potential database products.

Subject Gateways
Only eight respondents make use of Australian subject gateways, and the same number use overseas subject gateways.

PictureAustralia
20 respondents are current users of PictureAustralia, and 11 are not. The remainder of respondents did not answer this question.

Are you interested in participating in PictureAustralia as a contributor in the future Number of respondents
Yes 12
No 11
Existing contributor 5
No response 8

Digitisation
12 respondents have digitised at least some parts of their library collection. Five did not respond to this question, and 19 have not digitised any resources.

Digitisation standards
There is no obvious standard in use. Some respondents were unaware of the standards in use in their institution, and other institutions are still working on an inhouse standard. The National Library makes its digitisation information available online at http://www.nla.gov.au/digital/capture.html

Availability of digitised resources
Only six organisations make their digitised images available outside their institution. They include the Australian War Memorial, the National Gallery of Australia, the National Library and the State Library of New South Wales.
Access is either via the website or the library catalogue, and the organisations above are also in PictureAustralia. Some organisations which do not make their images generally available will make images available upon request.

Suggestions for discussion areas at the 2004 Forum
Suggestions put forward by respondents were:

  • Prioritising/identifying resources with a view to seeking cooperation and funding for digitisation or online database projects
  • Ways of cooperating
  • Joint projects
  • Approaching vendors about database pricing to suit small libraries
  • The need for a visual arts gateway
  • Access to guerilla resources
  • ALG potential and enhancements
  • National standard for digitisation
  • The high cost of images from some PictureAustralia providers
  • Copyright
  • Standards for the description of pictorial material/images