Presented by Debra Klein at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 3rd - April 6th, 2013, in Providence, Rhode Island.
Session #09: Documenting the Art of Africa: Creating New Vocabularies
ORGANIZER: Karen Kessel, Sonoma State University
MODERATOR: Carole Pawloski, Eastern Michigan University
PRESENTERS:
Debra Klein, Bard College
Jennifer Larson, Department of the Arts of Africa, Oceania and the Americas, Metropolitan Museum of Art
Carole Pawloski, Eastern Michigan University
Endorsed by the Education Committee
Over 100 years ago, artists like Picasso and Gauguin found novel inspiration for their art in the creative works of art from exotic places like Africa and the South Pacific. Digital technology has created the ability to more widely share the resources that we manage yet our vocabulary in describing them is limited. Most Western cultures still view traditional arts of the African continent with a Western aesthetic. People are more interested in how the work is formally viewed than its original function or how and why it was created and how it is displayed. There is often much lacking with record descriptions, cataloging and display that would both enhance the work and give viewers a more accurate understanding of each object. More complete records would enhance the usefulness of object records for multiple disciplines. The influence of African art on the work of Western artists could be documented in the object records. This session will strive to provide these missing elements and further cultural understanding by presenting some of the concerns about the documentation of objects being addressed by current scholars in African art history and related fields. It will touch on the evolving standards and codification of traditional African art, the multiplicity of functionality within objects, and how to better convey meaning through the documentation and contextual display of objects. At the same time, we need to be aware that these cultures may express a need to limit the sharing of information about works that have special significance to their own cultural communities or ethnic groups.
Thursday April 4, 2013 1:35pm - 2:55pm
Afro-Asian literature began as oral traditions that documented the experiences and cultures of African and Asian people. It reflected their customs, traditions, philosophies, and struggles for independence. While initially passed down orally due to lack of literacy, Afro-Asian literature later developed written genres like poetry, songs, plays, and textbooks to both entertain and educate about history and culture. Today, it continues to allow people to learn about different experiences and cultures from around the world.
Afro-Asian literature refers to writings from Africa and Asia that reflect the traditions, customs, and philosophies of those regions. It includes oral traditions as well as contemporary written works like poems, plays, and prose from various countries and cultures. Literary works in this genre often emphasize the history, culture, and struggles of Afro-Asian peoples while also addressing common themes like nature, peace, and emotions. Examples include the poem "Petals of Blood" about respecting nature's power, and the novel "No Longer at Ease" concerning colonialism's impact in Nigeria.
Folklore in Literature: A Tool for Culture Preservation and Entertainmentinventionjournals
International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Invention (IJHSSI) is an international journal intended for professionals and researchers in all fields of Humanities and Social Science. IJHSSI publishes research articles and reviews within the whole field Humanities and Social Science, new teaching methods, assessment, validation and the impact of new technologies and it will continue to provide information on the latest trends and developments in this ever-expanding subject. The publications of papers are selected through double peer reviewed to ensure originality, relevance, and readability. The articles published in our journal can be accessed online.
Afro-Asian Literature (African Chants and Songs)Edselsheen
This document discusses African folk literature and oral traditions. It notes that Africa has many rich folktales that link the past to the present and contain moral lessons. These stories were traditionally communicated through skilled storytellers called griots, using music, dance, and sometimes masks. However, the traditions were disrupted by European colonization in the late 19th century. While literary writing has increased since then, most contemporary African writers still draw from oral traditions in their work. The document also examines the importance of chanting in African daily life and traditions, such as hunting poems and songs sung during agricultural work.
The document provides an overview of major themes, styles, and historical events in African art from the modern era. It discusses common beliefs like the importance of ancestors and fertility. Spirituality and woodcarving were dominant. Architecture typically used mud bricks. The modern era began with European exploration and colonization in the 19th century, influencing African art. Various regions and cultures produced distinctive sculptures, masks, and other art forms to serve spiritual and cultural purposes.
Africa is the second largest continent covering over one-fifth of the Earth's surface. It comprises 46 countries and territories. Islam is the dominant religion in northern Africa, having replaced Christianity in the 17th century. Literary rates are higher for men than women and education levels are higher in urban than rural areas. Famous works of African literature explore themes of racial discrimination, apartheid, political conflicts, and human rights issues. Literature provides insights into universal human experiences.
The document provides an overview of various artworks from Pacific cultures, including Easter Island heads, Aboriginal cave paintings from Australia, painted bark cloths from New Guinea, and woodcarvings and meeting houses from Maori culture. The artworks showcase stylistic traditions like x-ray imagery, geometric patterns, and ancestral figures. They also served important cultural functions like symbolizing status, recording creation myths, and honoring the dead through ceremonies and rituals.
Africa is the second largest continent covering about 30.2 million square kilometers. It has an incredibly diverse array of peoples, languages, and cultures. The main language families include Afroasiatic, Nilo-Saharan, and Niger-Congo languages. Africa has a long tradition of oral literature including myths, epics, praise poems, proverbs and more. These oral traditions play an important role in African culture and continue to be an influential form of expression.
Afro-Asian literature began as oral traditions that documented the experiences and cultures of African and Asian people. It reflected their customs, traditions, philosophies, and struggles for independence. While initially passed down orally due to lack of literacy, Afro-Asian literature later developed written genres like poetry, songs, plays, and textbooks to both entertain and educate about history and culture. Today, it continues to allow people to learn about different experiences and cultures from around the world.
Afro-Asian literature refers to writings from Africa and Asia that reflect the traditions, customs, and philosophies of those regions. It includes oral traditions as well as contemporary written works like poems, plays, and prose from various countries and cultures. Literary works in this genre often emphasize the history, culture, and struggles of Afro-Asian peoples while also addressing common themes like nature, peace, and emotions. Examples include the poem "Petals of Blood" about respecting nature's power, and the novel "No Longer at Ease" concerning colonialism's impact in Nigeria.
Folklore in Literature: A Tool for Culture Preservation and Entertainmentinventionjournals
International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Invention (IJHSSI) is an international journal intended for professionals and researchers in all fields of Humanities and Social Science. IJHSSI publishes research articles and reviews within the whole field Humanities and Social Science, new teaching methods, assessment, validation and the impact of new technologies and it will continue to provide information on the latest trends and developments in this ever-expanding subject. The publications of papers are selected through double peer reviewed to ensure originality, relevance, and readability. The articles published in our journal can be accessed online.
Afro-Asian Literature (African Chants and Songs)Edselsheen
This document discusses African folk literature and oral traditions. It notes that Africa has many rich folktales that link the past to the present and contain moral lessons. These stories were traditionally communicated through skilled storytellers called griots, using music, dance, and sometimes masks. However, the traditions were disrupted by European colonization in the late 19th century. While literary writing has increased since then, most contemporary African writers still draw from oral traditions in their work. The document also examines the importance of chanting in African daily life and traditions, such as hunting poems and songs sung during agricultural work.
The document provides an overview of major themes, styles, and historical events in African art from the modern era. It discusses common beliefs like the importance of ancestors and fertility. Spirituality and woodcarving were dominant. Architecture typically used mud bricks. The modern era began with European exploration and colonization in the 19th century, influencing African art. Various regions and cultures produced distinctive sculptures, masks, and other art forms to serve spiritual and cultural purposes.
Africa is the second largest continent covering over one-fifth of the Earth's surface. It comprises 46 countries and territories. Islam is the dominant religion in northern Africa, having replaced Christianity in the 17th century. Literary rates are higher for men than women and education levels are higher in urban than rural areas. Famous works of African literature explore themes of racial discrimination, apartheid, political conflicts, and human rights issues. Literature provides insights into universal human experiences.
The document provides an overview of various artworks from Pacific cultures, including Easter Island heads, Aboriginal cave paintings from Australia, painted bark cloths from New Guinea, and woodcarvings and meeting houses from Maori culture. The artworks showcase stylistic traditions like x-ray imagery, geometric patterns, and ancestral figures. They also served important cultural functions like symbolizing status, recording creation myths, and honoring the dead through ceremonies and rituals.
Africa is the second largest continent covering about 30.2 million square kilometers. It has an incredibly diverse array of peoples, languages, and cultures. The main language families include Afroasiatic, Nilo-Saharan, and Niger-Congo languages. Africa has a long tradition of oral literature including myths, epics, praise poems, proverbs and more. These oral traditions play an important role in African culture and continue to be an influential form of expression.
African literature has a strong oral tradition and incorporates important truths and teachings. It uses artistic language to build communities rather than just for beauty. Major themes include pre-colonial oral myths, slave narratives from the colonial period, and post-independence works addressing themes of liberation, tradition vs modernity, and social issues. Famous African authors represented include Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Olaudah Equiano, and his memoir describing the harrowing conditions aboard a slave ship.
Chapter 9 euroean outreach and expansionKaren Owens
- Marco Polo traveled to China in the late 13th century and his account of his travels, published as a book, became very popular in Europe.
- Christopher Columbus sailed for Spain in 1492 and his discovery of the Americas led to major European colonization of the region.
- Native peoples across North and South America developed rich cultural traditions including architecture, art, religion, and oral histories despite lacking written languages. Many advanced civilizations arose, such as the Olmecs, Maya, Aztec, and Inca empires.
- Beginning in the 15th and 16th centuries, European powers like Spain conquered and colonized the Americas, destroying many indigenous cultures and disrupting long established societies
This document provides an overview of literature, including its history and major forms. It discusses how literature originated in early civilizations through oral and written traditions. The major forms are poetry, which uses aesthetic qualities of language, and prose, which uses ordinary syntax. The document also summarizes different types of prose and discusses literature in the Philippines from pre-Hispanic epics to forms that developed during the Spanish colonial period like religious poetry, metrical romances, corridos and awit. It notes how Filipino intellectuals in the 19th century began writing about colonization, fueling calls for reform.
This document provides an overview of African literature, including its origins and development. It discusses the oral traditions that formed the early literary background in Africa and how written literature later emerged through interactions with Islam, Christianity, and colonialism. Major genres like novels, poetry, and plays are examined. The document also profiles important literary movements like Negritude and analyzes works by seminal African writers such as Senghor, Soyinka, Achebe, and others who addressed themes of identity, culture, and the African experience.
The document provides an overview of Chinese literary history from ancient dynasties like Shang and Han to modern times. Key points include:
- The Shang Dynasty in 1600 BC marked the earliest Chinese literature found in oracle bones containing early forms of Chinese writing.
- Confucius established Confucianism in the 500s BC, emphasizing moral character development and responsibility through rules of behavior.
- The Tang Dynasty in the 7th-12th centuries AD was a golden age of poetry, philosophy, and arts with famous poets like Li Po and Tu Fu.
- Lu Xun introduced modern Chinese literature in the early 20th century with works criticizing traditional culture like "Diary of a Madman."
Organic Growth of Folk Epics: Ownership and Contestation of Tamil Folk Epic A...inventionjournals
This paper makes an attempt to establish the fact that it is only the singers and performers of
the folk epic who provide validity and acceptance to it because they are the ones who pass on what they have
received from the earlier generation to the future generation. To prove this fact, it gives an account of the way
in which the three texts of the Tamil folk epic AnnanmarKathai were formed and gives the details of the people
who helped the formation of these texts. It identifies women, myths and performance process as the undying
elements of folk epics and folk religion. The paper records the ownerships that have been made on the epics and
tests their veracity. The contestations made on the epic also go through the same process. The way folk epic and
folk religion appropriate the Vedic and classical elements are referred to and the universal elements compared
with another Finnish folk epic Kalevala. The experiences of the audio-recording of the folk epic
AnnanmarKathai are shared to draw certain conclusions like the singers and performers are the real guardian
angels of folk epic and folk religion. The paper also makes certain recommendations.
in this presentation you can able to know and understand our literary compositions ,a little knowledge about edsa revolution on how it affects the freedom of speech in our country ,explain the difference of modern and traditional poetry in our country ...
This document summarizes an article that discusses how the artist Clement Akpang uses "Hybrid Aesthetics" to incorporate traditional African symbols and scripts into modern paintings and sculptures. It describes one of Akpang's works called "Identity I 2012", which adapts traditional African symbols through a hybrid process of hand drawing, digital manipulation, and screen printing. The document argues that this process recontextualizes traditional visual culture in a contemporary art form, demonstrating traditionalism within modernism. It also discusses how the repetitive elements and multiplicity of the work challenge ideas of originality and authenticity in modern African art.
The document summarizes the evolution of minstrels from ancient times to the present day. It describes how minstrels originated as singers who spread news and epics in pre-industrial societies. It discusses different types of minstrels that emerged in various cultures across history, such as rhapsodists in Greece, troubadours in medieval Europe, ashiks in Turkey and Azerbaijan, and manaschi who perform the Epic of Manas in Kyrgyzstan. The roles of minstrels have changed over time with social and technological developments but some traditions still exist today.
1. The arts of Oceania encompass decorated skin and body art across Polynesia, Melanesia, and Australia.
2. In Polynesia, tattooing (moko) and bark cloth (tapa) were important art forms with cultural and symbolic meanings.
3. The massive stone moai figures on Easter Island represented ancestors and were carved beginning around 1000 CE.
Hula originated in Hawaii before the 19th century and was performed to honor the volcano goddess Pele. In the 19th century, American missionaries banned hula and other Hawaiian cultural practices as immoral. Hula was performed secretly until King Kalakaua helped revive it in the late 1800s. Hula is divided into ancient (kahiko) and modern (auana) styles and involves telling stories through dance movements. Costumes incorporate traditional Hawaiian elements like muumuus, tapa skirts and leis. Today hula has become an important part of Hawaiian culture and tourism.
Presented by Shalimar Fojas White at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 18th - April 21st, 2012, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Session: Archival Collections Case Studies
The digitization of historic archival collections can present a daunting array of challenges. Often archives were collected with poor documentation and little information about the creators or contributors to the collection. The processing of these archival collections sometimes requires special subject area expertise due to the content or special staffing considerations due to the sheer size of the project. This session focuses on three cases in which archival collections are being processed. Each presenter will discuss the special challenges within their own institutions’ collection and the solutions they have developed in such areas as copyright, workflow, cataloging, and assembling expert teams.
MODERATOR: Heather Lowe, California State University San Bernardino
PRESENTERS:
• Trevor Alvord, James Madison University
“Delivering oral histories”
• Claire Dienes, Metropolitan Museum of Art
“A 35mm collection assessment & digitization initiative at The Metropolitan Museum of Art”
• Shalimar Fojas White, Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection
“The Artamonoff Business: Using Collections Research for Outreach and Strategic Communication"
The document summarizes a session from the Visual Resources Association Annual Conference on making collection content more openly accessible while respecting copyright. It discusses various strategies that libraries and museums are using, including systematic digitization of public domain works, fair use of thumbnails, and partnerships with organizations like ARTstor to share images. The Brooklyn Museum project to clear copyrights on its collection is presented as a case study, outlining their process of educating staff, defining workflows, and partnering internally and externally to research over 24,000 works and 800 artists. Considerations for fair use and working with external partners like Google Art Project are also addressed.
At the VRA Annual Business meeting we recognized the contributions and lives of those members who have passed since VRA's 25th Anniversary ceremony, including a tribute to Nancy Schuller, one of VRA's founders.
Presented by Helen Lessick at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 3rd - April 6th, 2013, in Providence, Rhode Island.
Session #2: Visual Resourcefulness and the Public Art Challenge
ORGANIZER/MODERATOR: Helen Lessick, Web Resources for Art in Public
PRESENTERS:
Jack Becker, founder of Forecast Public Art and Public Art Review
Rachel Cain, Public Art Archive, WESTAF (Western States Arts Federation)
Elizabeth Keithline, Project Grants/Public Art Management, Rhode Island State Council on the Arts
Abby Suckle, CultureNOW
Visual resources are key to collections within and outside of the museum and academic worlds. Public art, art in public places, civic art and design, and artist-initiated projects all contribute to a growing national collection.
This session will present the diverse approaches to organizing and presenting public art collections online and discuss the challenges of working with municipal and for-profit clients in the field based on policy, innovation, collaboration and context.
This session will present challenges and opportunities for VRA members to engage the public art field locally and nationally, and build networks for catalogers and public art collection professionals across the nation.
Wednesday April 3, 2013 1:35pm - 2:55pm
This document discusses a project to catalog and make publicly accessible the archival collections of public television programs related to quilting and needlework held by WGBH in Boston. The project involves scholars watching and tagging episodes from early WGBH shows with descriptive metadata. As an example, the document provides detailed metadata tagged by the author for episodes of "Erica", a 1971-1976 needlework instruction program. It explains the learning process for determining the optimal metadata scheme and gives examples of the rich descriptive information and subjects added by the scholars. The goal is to publish the fully cataloged archives online to increase access and awareness of these cultural heritage materials.
The document discusses digital imaging technologies presented at the Visual Resources Association's 31st annual conference in 2013. It describes how digital imaging does not always require new technologies, as older methods like microfilm and view cameras can be adapted. Both formal technologies like Photoshop and 3D scanning/printing, and more casual apps like Snapchat and Instagram were discussed. Specific features of Photoshop CS6 and examples of 3D scanning, 3D printing, digital cameras, and mobile apps were presented.
Presented by Gregory Reser at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 18th - April 21st, 2012, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Session: Embedded metadata in cultural image collections and beyond
Over the past few years visual resources professionals have increasingly been using embedded metadata as an effective way to collect initial cataloging data, to ensure the delivery of key information with images, to archive image information, and to link VRA Core 4 with other schemas in the larger digital imaging environment. The activities and case study examples presented by panel members will include improving workflow efficiency within visual resources operations and developing ongoing relations with the International Press Telecommunications Council, a pioneer in embedding metadata into images. While this work addresses the immediate needs of visual resources for art, architecture, and related fields, it simultaneously looks outward to the increasing interoperability of all digital materials available in library collections and on the world wide web.
ORGANIZER & MODERATOR: Steve Tatum, Virginia Tech
PRESENTERS:
1: Sheryl Frisch, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
2: Joshua Lynn and Heidi Raatz, Minneapolis Institute of Arts
3: Gregory Reser, University of California, San Diego
4: Steve Tatum, Virginia Tech
A highlight of the Conference, the Awards Luncheon brings us together for a full buffet luncheon in an elegant setting as we announce the recipients of the Association’s major honors and awards.
Elizabeth Schaub, The University of Texas at Austin presentation at VRA 28 Atlanta.
From the "Utilizing Blogs to Improve and Market Resources" session.
Kari R. Smith, History of Art, VRC
Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor presentation for VRA 28 Atlanta.
Embedded Metadata and the Long Now from "Embedded Metadata: Share, Deliver, Preserve" session.
Presented by Stephanie Beene at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 18th - April 21st, 2012, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Session: Visual Literacy Case Studies
The term “visual literacy” was first coined in 1969 by Jack Debes of Kodak, co-founder of the International Visual Literacy Association. According to the Association of College and Research Libraries “Visual Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education,” visual literacy “is a set of abilities that enables an individual to effectively find, interpret, evaluate, use, and create images and visual media. Visual literacy skills equip a learner to understand and analyze the contextual, cultural, ethical, aesthetic, intellectual, and technical components involved in the production and use of visual materials. A visually literate individual is both a critical consumer of visual media and a competent contributor to a body of shared knowledge and culture.”
The three case studies in this session will explore (1) implementing visual literacy standards and guidelines at Lewis & Clark College, (2) visual literacy among library and information science students at Wayne State University, and (3) curating and building a collection of image-based art history exam questions at Michigan State University.
MODERATOR: John Taormina, Duke University
PRESENTERS:
• Joan Beaudoin, Wayne State University
“A Case Study of Visual Literacy Among Library and Information Science Students.”
• Stephanie Beene, Lewis & Clark College
“Implementing Visual Literacy Standards and Guidelines at Lewis & Clark.”
• Alex Nichols, Michigan State University
“Curating Questions: Building a Collection of Image-Based Art History Exam Questions.”
African literature has a strong oral tradition and incorporates important truths and teachings. It uses artistic language to build communities rather than just for beauty. Major themes include pre-colonial oral myths, slave narratives from the colonial period, and post-independence works addressing themes of liberation, tradition vs modernity, and social issues. Famous African authors represented include Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Olaudah Equiano, and his memoir describing the harrowing conditions aboard a slave ship.
Chapter 9 euroean outreach and expansionKaren Owens
- Marco Polo traveled to China in the late 13th century and his account of his travels, published as a book, became very popular in Europe.
- Christopher Columbus sailed for Spain in 1492 and his discovery of the Americas led to major European colonization of the region.
- Native peoples across North and South America developed rich cultural traditions including architecture, art, religion, and oral histories despite lacking written languages. Many advanced civilizations arose, such as the Olmecs, Maya, Aztec, and Inca empires.
- Beginning in the 15th and 16th centuries, European powers like Spain conquered and colonized the Americas, destroying many indigenous cultures and disrupting long established societies
This document provides an overview of literature, including its history and major forms. It discusses how literature originated in early civilizations through oral and written traditions. The major forms are poetry, which uses aesthetic qualities of language, and prose, which uses ordinary syntax. The document also summarizes different types of prose and discusses literature in the Philippines from pre-Hispanic epics to forms that developed during the Spanish colonial period like religious poetry, metrical romances, corridos and awit. It notes how Filipino intellectuals in the 19th century began writing about colonization, fueling calls for reform.
This document provides an overview of African literature, including its origins and development. It discusses the oral traditions that formed the early literary background in Africa and how written literature later emerged through interactions with Islam, Christianity, and colonialism. Major genres like novels, poetry, and plays are examined. The document also profiles important literary movements like Negritude and analyzes works by seminal African writers such as Senghor, Soyinka, Achebe, and others who addressed themes of identity, culture, and the African experience.
The document provides an overview of Chinese literary history from ancient dynasties like Shang and Han to modern times. Key points include:
- The Shang Dynasty in 1600 BC marked the earliest Chinese literature found in oracle bones containing early forms of Chinese writing.
- Confucius established Confucianism in the 500s BC, emphasizing moral character development and responsibility through rules of behavior.
- The Tang Dynasty in the 7th-12th centuries AD was a golden age of poetry, philosophy, and arts with famous poets like Li Po and Tu Fu.
- Lu Xun introduced modern Chinese literature in the early 20th century with works criticizing traditional culture like "Diary of a Madman."
Organic Growth of Folk Epics: Ownership and Contestation of Tamil Folk Epic A...inventionjournals
This paper makes an attempt to establish the fact that it is only the singers and performers of
the folk epic who provide validity and acceptance to it because they are the ones who pass on what they have
received from the earlier generation to the future generation. To prove this fact, it gives an account of the way
in which the three texts of the Tamil folk epic AnnanmarKathai were formed and gives the details of the people
who helped the formation of these texts. It identifies women, myths and performance process as the undying
elements of folk epics and folk religion. The paper records the ownerships that have been made on the epics and
tests their veracity. The contestations made on the epic also go through the same process. The way folk epic and
folk religion appropriate the Vedic and classical elements are referred to and the universal elements compared
with another Finnish folk epic Kalevala. The experiences of the audio-recording of the folk epic
AnnanmarKathai are shared to draw certain conclusions like the singers and performers are the real guardian
angels of folk epic and folk religion. The paper also makes certain recommendations.
in this presentation you can able to know and understand our literary compositions ,a little knowledge about edsa revolution on how it affects the freedom of speech in our country ,explain the difference of modern and traditional poetry in our country ...
This document summarizes an article that discusses how the artist Clement Akpang uses "Hybrid Aesthetics" to incorporate traditional African symbols and scripts into modern paintings and sculptures. It describes one of Akpang's works called "Identity I 2012", which adapts traditional African symbols through a hybrid process of hand drawing, digital manipulation, and screen printing. The document argues that this process recontextualizes traditional visual culture in a contemporary art form, demonstrating traditionalism within modernism. It also discusses how the repetitive elements and multiplicity of the work challenge ideas of originality and authenticity in modern African art.
The document summarizes the evolution of minstrels from ancient times to the present day. It describes how minstrels originated as singers who spread news and epics in pre-industrial societies. It discusses different types of minstrels that emerged in various cultures across history, such as rhapsodists in Greece, troubadours in medieval Europe, ashiks in Turkey and Azerbaijan, and manaschi who perform the Epic of Manas in Kyrgyzstan. The roles of minstrels have changed over time with social and technological developments but some traditions still exist today.
1. The arts of Oceania encompass decorated skin and body art across Polynesia, Melanesia, and Australia.
2. In Polynesia, tattooing (moko) and bark cloth (tapa) were important art forms with cultural and symbolic meanings.
3. The massive stone moai figures on Easter Island represented ancestors and were carved beginning around 1000 CE.
Hula originated in Hawaii before the 19th century and was performed to honor the volcano goddess Pele. In the 19th century, American missionaries banned hula and other Hawaiian cultural practices as immoral. Hula was performed secretly until King Kalakaua helped revive it in the late 1800s. Hula is divided into ancient (kahiko) and modern (auana) styles and involves telling stories through dance movements. Costumes incorporate traditional Hawaiian elements like muumuus, tapa skirts and leis. Today hula has become an important part of Hawaiian culture and tourism.
Presented by Shalimar Fojas White at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 18th - April 21st, 2012, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Session: Archival Collections Case Studies
The digitization of historic archival collections can present a daunting array of challenges. Often archives were collected with poor documentation and little information about the creators or contributors to the collection. The processing of these archival collections sometimes requires special subject area expertise due to the content or special staffing considerations due to the sheer size of the project. This session focuses on three cases in which archival collections are being processed. Each presenter will discuss the special challenges within their own institutions’ collection and the solutions they have developed in such areas as copyright, workflow, cataloging, and assembling expert teams.
MODERATOR: Heather Lowe, California State University San Bernardino
PRESENTERS:
• Trevor Alvord, James Madison University
“Delivering oral histories”
• Claire Dienes, Metropolitan Museum of Art
“A 35mm collection assessment & digitization initiative at The Metropolitan Museum of Art”
• Shalimar Fojas White, Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection
“The Artamonoff Business: Using Collections Research for Outreach and Strategic Communication"
The document summarizes a session from the Visual Resources Association Annual Conference on making collection content more openly accessible while respecting copyright. It discusses various strategies that libraries and museums are using, including systematic digitization of public domain works, fair use of thumbnails, and partnerships with organizations like ARTstor to share images. The Brooklyn Museum project to clear copyrights on its collection is presented as a case study, outlining their process of educating staff, defining workflows, and partnering internally and externally to research over 24,000 works and 800 artists. Considerations for fair use and working with external partners like Google Art Project are also addressed.
At the VRA Annual Business meeting we recognized the contributions and lives of those members who have passed since VRA's 25th Anniversary ceremony, including a tribute to Nancy Schuller, one of VRA's founders.
Presented by Helen Lessick at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 3rd - April 6th, 2013, in Providence, Rhode Island.
Session #2: Visual Resourcefulness and the Public Art Challenge
ORGANIZER/MODERATOR: Helen Lessick, Web Resources for Art in Public
PRESENTERS:
Jack Becker, founder of Forecast Public Art and Public Art Review
Rachel Cain, Public Art Archive, WESTAF (Western States Arts Federation)
Elizabeth Keithline, Project Grants/Public Art Management, Rhode Island State Council on the Arts
Abby Suckle, CultureNOW
Visual resources are key to collections within and outside of the museum and academic worlds. Public art, art in public places, civic art and design, and artist-initiated projects all contribute to a growing national collection.
This session will present the diverse approaches to organizing and presenting public art collections online and discuss the challenges of working with municipal and for-profit clients in the field based on policy, innovation, collaboration and context.
This session will present challenges and opportunities for VRA members to engage the public art field locally and nationally, and build networks for catalogers and public art collection professionals across the nation.
Wednesday April 3, 2013 1:35pm - 2:55pm
This document discusses a project to catalog and make publicly accessible the archival collections of public television programs related to quilting and needlework held by WGBH in Boston. The project involves scholars watching and tagging episodes from early WGBH shows with descriptive metadata. As an example, the document provides detailed metadata tagged by the author for episodes of "Erica", a 1971-1976 needlework instruction program. It explains the learning process for determining the optimal metadata scheme and gives examples of the rich descriptive information and subjects added by the scholars. The goal is to publish the fully cataloged archives online to increase access and awareness of these cultural heritage materials.
The document discusses digital imaging technologies presented at the Visual Resources Association's 31st annual conference in 2013. It describes how digital imaging does not always require new technologies, as older methods like microfilm and view cameras can be adapted. Both formal technologies like Photoshop and 3D scanning/printing, and more casual apps like Snapchat and Instagram were discussed. Specific features of Photoshop CS6 and examples of 3D scanning, 3D printing, digital cameras, and mobile apps were presented.
Presented by Gregory Reser at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 18th - April 21st, 2012, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Session: Embedded metadata in cultural image collections and beyond
Over the past few years visual resources professionals have increasingly been using embedded metadata as an effective way to collect initial cataloging data, to ensure the delivery of key information with images, to archive image information, and to link VRA Core 4 with other schemas in the larger digital imaging environment. The activities and case study examples presented by panel members will include improving workflow efficiency within visual resources operations and developing ongoing relations with the International Press Telecommunications Council, a pioneer in embedding metadata into images. While this work addresses the immediate needs of visual resources for art, architecture, and related fields, it simultaneously looks outward to the increasing interoperability of all digital materials available in library collections and on the world wide web.
ORGANIZER & MODERATOR: Steve Tatum, Virginia Tech
PRESENTERS:
1: Sheryl Frisch, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
2: Joshua Lynn and Heidi Raatz, Minneapolis Institute of Arts
3: Gregory Reser, University of California, San Diego
4: Steve Tatum, Virginia Tech
A highlight of the Conference, the Awards Luncheon brings us together for a full buffet luncheon in an elegant setting as we announce the recipients of the Association’s major honors and awards.
Elizabeth Schaub, The University of Texas at Austin presentation at VRA 28 Atlanta.
From the "Utilizing Blogs to Improve and Market Resources" session.
Kari R. Smith, History of Art, VRC
Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor presentation for VRA 28 Atlanta.
Embedded Metadata and the Long Now from "Embedded Metadata: Share, Deliver, Preserve" session.
Presented by Stephanie Beene at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 18th - April 21st, 2012, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Session: Visual Literacy Case Studies
The term “visual literacy” was first coined in 1969 by Jack Debes of Kodak, co-founder of the International Visual Literacy Association. According to the Association of College and Research Libraries “Visual Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education,” visual literacy “is a set of abilities that enables an individual to effectively find, interpret, evaluate, use, and create images and visual media. Visual literacy skills equip a learner to understand and analyze the contextual, cultural, ethical, aesthetic, intellectual, and technical components involved in the production and use of visual materials. A visually literate individual is both a critical consumer of visual media and a competent contributor to a body of shared knowledge and culture.”
The three case studies in this session will explore (1) implementing visual literacy standards and guidelines at Lewis & Clark College, (2) visual literacy among library and information science students at Wayne State University, and (3) curating and building a collection of image-based art history exam questions at Michigan State University.
MODERATOR: John Taormina, Duke University
PRESENTERS:
• Joan Beaudoin, Wayne State University
“A Case Study of Visual Literacy Among Library and Information Science Students.”
• Stephanie Beene, Lewis & Clark College
“Implementing Visual Literacy Standards and Guidelines at Lewis & Clark.”
• Alex Nichols, Michigan State University
“Curating Questions: Building a Collection of Image-Based Art History Exam Questions.”
Presented by John Taormina at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 3rd - April 6th, 2013, in Providence, Rhode Island.
Session #12: Making the Digital Humanities Visual: Opportunities and Case Studies
ORGANIZER/MODERATOR: Sarah Christensen, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
PRESENTERS:
John Taormina, Duke University
Sarah Christensen, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Massimo Riva, Brown University
Endorsed by the Education Committee
The digital humanities are shaping the way that scholars teach and perform research, providing them with tools to answer existing research questions or to pioneer new approaches in their respective fields. This session seeks to explore opportunities in which visual resources professionals can contribute to or initiate digital humanities projects, utilizing specialized knowledge in visual media to form new partnerships with interdisciplinary collaborators.
John Taormina from Duke University will speak about his experience as part of a discussion group called “Digital Technologies and the Visual Arts: Reconfiguring Knowledge in the Digital Age,” which addressed new media technologies in art history research and teaching with a focus on digital literacy, pedagogy, and scholarly viability. The group met for two years and gained interest from faculty and staff from across campus, and resulted in a week long workshop that has now been offered both at Duke and at Venice International University.
Sarah Christensen from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign will discuss “Explore CU,” an Omeka based mobile app developed by researchers at Cleveland State University. The mobile app and accompanying Omeka site aims to curate the art, culture, and history of Champaign-Urbana through community contributed content.
Massimo Riva, Director of the Virtual Humanities Lab at Brown University, will present the Garibaldi Panorama Project. This project is a “digital archive that seeks to provide a comprehensive resource for the interdisciplinary study and teaching of the life and deeds of one of the protagonists of the Italian unification process (1807-1882), against the historical backdrop of 19th-century Europe, reconstructed with the help of materials from special collections at the Brown University libraries. The project will devote particular attention to the way Garibaldi’s figure, his actions and the Italian Risorgimento as a whole were portrayed in contemporary media.”
Presentation was given by Meghan Musolff (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor) and Bryan Loar (Director of Knowledge Management & Research, SC search consultants) as part of the Engaging New Technologies session at the 2011 VRA + ARLIS/NA joint conference on March 26, 2011.
The treasurer's report summarizes the organization's finances from 2012-2013. In FY2012, the organization had a net operating deficit of $4,004.58 with total assets of $487,805.19 as of March 2013. Membership dues and conference income were the largest sources of revenue in FY2011-2012, totaling $142,124.40. Conference and chapter expenses made up the largest expenses that year at $63,580.70 and $4,704.04 respectively. Excluding those costs, basic operations in FY2011-2012 equated to $126.58 per member.
xxxx ARH2000 Fall 2017 Harn Diversity Project .docxadampcarr67227
xxxx
ARH2000
Fall 2017
Harn Diversity Project
Introduction
The city of Gainesville is home to a vast population of over one hundred thousand
people, yet with that large population comes a very high fraction of residents represented by only
two groups. The balance of races shows a heavy tilt towards Caucasians and African-Americans,
with almost ninety percent of people falling into those two categories and the majority of them
being in the former (Areavibes). Perhaps this has to do with Gainesville not being a particular
hub of travel, tourism or development (despite the constant construction seen around the city) but
rather a community based around a university. It is the college in this “college-town,” however,
that helps to strengthen the population’s diversity.
While the Gainesville may not be all that diverse, the University of Florida assists in
bringing a broader range of different characteristics. People from all around the world are
represented on campus, with a slightly more balanced population at hand. The percentage of
Caucasians is lower and Hispanic/Latino people hold the second largest group at UF at
approximately twenty-two percent. Asian and African-American students represent two other
main ethnicities found on campus, with American Indian, Multi-race, Pacific Islander, and
unknown making up the rest of the population (Collegedata).
!
2!
One of the greatest attributes of the University of Florida is its capacity to entertain the
interests of over all fifty thousand of its students. Other than the many different educational
routes that pertain to different aspects of diversity, there are over a thousand registered student
organizations and clubs available, many of which focusing on religion, heritage and culture
(Student Activities and Involvement). Another superb element of the university is its very own
Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art, which brings together artwork from around the world in order to
showcase different pieces of culture right here in Gainesville. The museum offers the
opportunity to let art-lovers, random passersby, and everyone that falls in between experience
fascinating collections from different time periods and distant locations. By doing this, one can
learn about different peoples and catch a glimpse into the lives of others far different from them.
One such collection is the Harn Museum’s African Collection, an assemblage of art
representative of the peoples of Sub-Saharan Africa, that is incredibly and beautifully different
from the culture here in Gainesville.
A Look Into African Art, History and Culture
African art history incorporates a wide variety of different peoples spread out over the
continent, and with those many peoples come many cultures. Throughout the course, many
topics discussed originate from the ancient history of Africa, starting with one of the oldest
pieces of art being found in South Africa.
This document discusses the depiction of reproduction and sexuality in art throughout history. It begins by exploring ancient fertility figures and symbols meant to aid human reproduction. Examples shown include the Venus of Willendorf and Cycladic figures. It then examines depictions of idealized human couples from various cultures, including the Dogon primordial couple and the Arnolfini Portrait. The document also analyzes representations of lovemaking, sexuality, and the human form from different time periods and regions, such as Shunga prints, works by Koons and O'Keeffe, and photographs by Mapplethorpe and Opie. Finally, it looks at images related to pregnancy, childbirth, and progeny in cultures like the Maya
The Philosophical Demotion of the Sacred Feminine Form in Classical Art Atyeb Atum RE
This presentation is an exploration of how the Greek classical arts and its mythology appropriated the feminine intuitive abilities from the sacred universal Mother Goddess and her daughters, both in the heavens and here on Earth. It charts how the patriarchal system became an institution that still plagues Humanity today with its Male Dominated ideologies adopted from many Greek philosophers and how they viewed women.
This document discusses various aspects of Australian Aboriginal culture, including their origins and migration to Australia over 50,000 years ago, their understanding of the night sky which aided travel, the concept of Dreamtime which lessened conflict, how emotions are understood communally rather than individually, the importance of kinship and togetherness, and the three main styles of their cave paintings - stencil, x-ray, and geometric shapes. It also describes how their art tradition has evolved to include contemporary paintings on bark and wood.
This document discusses identity and globalization. It explores how identities are based on complex experiences like family, language, ethnicity, and community. It also examines how art can celebrate and reinforce aspects of community identity. While identities may be locally based, art allows them to take on global significance as local ideas and concepts reach international audiences. The document considers examples of indigenous art from Australia, Polynesia, and China that have gained prominence on the global stage.
The art of_africa_a_resource_for_educatorsTonatiuh Kualo
This resource provides information about African art for educators. It includes an overview of the collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which began with Nelson Rockefeller's acquisition of works in the 1940s. The resource aims to help teachers incorporate African art into their classrooms. It contains maps, background on African geography and history, descriptions of artistic techniques and forms, and images and explanations of 44 works in the Met's collection. Suggested classroom activities and comparisons to spark discussion are also included.
This document provides an overview of Yoruba art and culture from the Newark Museum collection. It discusses how, in Yoruba cosmology, art and life are interconnected. The Supreme Creator commissioned creativity deities to mold the first humans from clay and imbue them with souls. Art is thus integral to humanity and was used to transform the primordial wilderness. The document outlines some of the major Yoruba deities and religious beliefs. It also describes the two main styles of Yoruba art - naturalistic sculptures that capture recognizable likenesses, and stylized sculptures that convey meaning through abstraction. The pieces in the Newark Museum exhibition embody Yoruba spiritual concepts and values.
1. The document discusses theories of representation in museums from the 19th century modernist model to challenges to that model.
2. It focuses on how museums construct narratives through the selection and grouping of objects on display and how this produces knowledge.
3. It analyzes how the meanings of objects like the Ghost Dance shirt in the Kelvingrove Museum collection changed over time as the narratives constructed around it changed in response to different cultural perspectives.
Coffee with the Curators: Northwest Coast MasksQuinnBlack
Learn about the culture and arts of the Pacific Northwest Coast. This session will discuss the purpose of masks and the different types. A mask from our collection will be the focus.
“The West Indian writer is organically drawn to his history” (Derek Walcott 1...Eloivene Blake
“The West Indian writer is organically drawn to his history” (Derek Walcott 1963). Discussing the representation of and attitudes towards history in the work of two Caribbean poets.
The inclusion of text is successful at encouraging rather than limiting a viewer’s interpretation of art and this is most evident in power of text, particularly narrative text. The inclusion of text does not hinder the meaning of the image, but encourages the viewer to think beyond what is presented, thus develop multiple interpretations—this is the power of narrative text that leads the viewer to create a relationship of identification or empathy with the subject matter and the artist. For these reasons, artists such as Aminah Brenda Lynn Robinson, Pat Ward Williams, and Elizabeth Catlett include text as a narrative tool within their artwork, allowing the viewer to connect more closely with the subject matter and the artist. The use of first person narrative allows the viewer to temporarily occupy the artist’s identity or the subject’s identity, where the viewer can then develop an intimate relationship with the artwork. When a viewer visits an art gallery, often the viewer skims through the painting, sculpture, mixed media, or photograph at hand. The visual content is quickly consumed. Hence, a piece of art is barely given time for interpretation or deconstruction of its meaning. Too often people come out of art galleries looking exhausted, as if they had walked through a store rather than an art showing. The viewer does not take the time to discern the content of the visual arts and thus, the art is left without or little critical assessment. However, aiding the visual with text can change the viewer’s perception or encourage multiple interpretations of the work. Text causes the viewer to stop, and pause to read around, under, or, above the image, which leads the viewer to further assess the image. When establishing a relationship between the text and the image, the viewer is using the mechanism of dual coding. Dual coding, a phrase coined by Allan Pavio, a psychologist of the theory of cognition, is the process in which our mind shifts back and forth between the writing system and the visual system. Incorporating narrative text within the artwork enables the viewer to exercise dual coding to construct a unique relationship of identification or empathy.
To continue reading this paper please email art historian, Madelyne Oliver at: madelyne.oliver@yahoo.com
This is a presentation that contains information about the indigenous peoples of Central Mali called the Dogon. It contains examples of Dogon masks and cultural information about the design of African Masks. The masks of Africa are one of the art forms that makes the different regions distinct and this slideshow demonstrates the work of
The document provides an overview of early human art from the Paleolithic period, beginning around 77,000 BCE. Key points discussed include engraved ochre fragments found at Blombos Cave in South Africa dating to 77,000 BCE, which represent some of the earliest known examples of human artistic expression. Other early art discussed includes cave paintings from Lascaux, France around 15,000-13,000 BCE depicting animals such as bison and horses. The document examines debates around defining art and discusses how archaeological discoveries are continually updating our understanding of early human history and artistic practices.
The document discusses how art was stolen from Jews and others by the Nazis during the Holocaust, with some pieces being found but most still lost. It notes that many discovered works are in museums but not returned to their rightful owners, and there should be efforts to find and recover art stolen by the Nazis to give it back to owners. Hitler had his soldiers steal art from Jewish homes and would take specific works he wanted, showing his desire to strip everything from Jews.
Behind the Carnival Masks discusses the historical and ongoing uses of masks in Caribbean carnivals and religious traditions. Masks were used by enslaved Africans and their descendants to communicate with spirits and ancestors, find spiritual guidance, and express realities like solitude and alienation. Syncretism allowed African religions like Orisa to survive covertly through practices like associating orishas with Catholic saints. Today, carnival masks serve both as cultural remembrances of past traditions and symbols of freedom and anonymity during licensed periods of revelry.
Kemetic Roots of Library and Information Science, by Itibari M. ZuluRBG Communiversity
This document discusses the Kemetic (ancient Egyptian) roots of library and information science. It argues that contrary to traditional histories taught in Western library schools, libraries originated in ancient African societies like Kemet. Kemet had developed an advanced system for collecting, organizing, describing, preserving, and providing access to information thousands of years before Greece. This included a class of professionals to operate the system, making Kemet the birthplace of librarianship. The document provides historical context on ancient Kemet and evidence that the ancient Egyptians were an African people, before outlining aspects of literature, education, classification, and information storage in ancient Kemetic society that demonstrate it was the origin of the modern library institution.
Hopi Kachina TraditionFollowing the Sun and MoonAlph H. SecaPazSilviapm
The document provides information about the Hopi Kachina tradition and Koshares or sacred clowns in Pueblo cultures. It describes various Kachina spirits that the Hopi believe act as intermediaries between the human and spirit worlds like Muyingwa the Germination god. It also details the roles and rituals of Koshares, sacred clowns who are painted with black and white stripes and entertain but also maintain social order through humor and reversals. The document highlights objections from Native groups to the Boy Scout Koshare Dancers who have appropriated and performed Native ceremonies for decades without permission.
This document discusses various topics related to curated environments and curation, including reliquaries, ontologies, gift economies, artist-run galleries, and curatorship. It references exhibits, art colonies in New York, museums in different countries, and debates around open vs curated content online. The document brings together disparate references from art, anthropology, music, and museology to consider questions around curation, authorship, and different models of organizing cultural production and experiences.
The craft industry, oral literature and language in the development of touris...Alexander Decker
This document summarizes a research paper that examines the role of crafts, oral literature, and language in tourism development in Ghana. It finds that these three areas are important for their economic value, information exchange, sharing of experiences, and reducing biases. However, lack of marketing outlets and product finishing pose major challenges. The document provides historical context on increased interest in Africa after independence, and how crafts, textiles, and traditional attire have helped change perceptions. It discusses how crafts, oral literature, and music are interrelated through their organization and manipulation of sounds to create aesthetic experiences, despite language barriers. This benefits tourism by showcasing Ghana's unique cultural expressions.
Museum Wall Label ExamplesMuseum Wall Label Student ExamplesBe.docxkendalfarrier
Museum Wall Label Examples
Museum Wall Label Student Examples
Below, please see a few examples of the kind of wall label you could write, along with formatting examples for Parts A, B, and C of the assignment.
· These are actual student examples and are not "perfect" in that they sometimes have grammatical or spelling errors, and ways to be improved.
· These should give you an idea of both the format and layout of the assignment but do not offer a one-size-fits-all approach that can be adapted for any artwork or imagery.
·
Instead, please use your imagination, critical thinking, and research skills to develop your own unique wall label and approach to your individual assignment.
Example #1
Part A:
· Artist: Zoumana Sane
· Title:
Mami Wata
· Date: c. 1987
· Medium: pigment, glass
· Collection of Herbert M. and Shelley Cole
Part B:
Mami Wata, also referred to as The Holy Virgin of the Sea, is a water spirit and in this
picture, she is illustrated as a snake charmer, however, in other types of artwork, she can also be
interpreted as a mermaid or a combination of a mermaid and snake charmer. Her name’s literal
translation is “Mother Water” in English pidgin throughout Africa. She is mostly worshipped
throughout many African countries such as Senegal, Tanzania, Togo, and many more. She is a
creation from many African tribes based off of their indigenous history and a fusion of other
religions such as Christianity, Hindu religion, and Muslim religion and then interpreted with
their current history to create a new goddess of worship. For many African people, she is a
symbol of cultural unity between Africans and foreigners in an effort to better understand their
culture. Depending on the culture, she can also be seen as a nurturing mother, a seductive
mistress, a healer in both physical and spiritual ailments, and many more. Due to this, she is not
only adored but many people also fear her immense power.
Part C: Works Consulted
· “Arts for Water Spirits in Africa and Its Diaspora: Mami Wata.”
Art of Being Tuareg: Sahara Nomads in a Modern World / National Museum of African Art, africa.si.edu/exhibits/mamiwata/intro.html.
· Carwile, Christey. "The Water Goddess in Igbo Cosmology: Ogbuide of Oguta Lake (review)."
African Studies Review, vol. 51 no. 3, 2008, pp. 172-173. Project MUSE, doi:10.1353/arw.0.0121
· Drewal, Henry John. “Performing the Other: Mami Wata Worship in Africa.” TDR (1988-), vol. 32, no. 2, 1988, pp. 160–185. JSTOR, JSTOR,
www.jstor.org/stable/1145857Links to an external site..
· Osinubi, Taiwo Adetunji. "Provincializing Slavery: Atlantic Economies in Flora Nwapa’s Efuru.
Research in African Literatures, vol. 45 no. 3, 2014, pp. 1-26. Project MUSE, muse.jhu.edu/article/555709.
Example #2
Part A: Artwork Information
· Artist: El Zeft
· Title: "Nefertiti in a Gas Mask"
· Date: 2012
· Medium: spray paint graffiti stencil.
Similar to VRA 2013 Documenting the Art of Africa, Klein (20)
VRA 2023 Collections Management in Fashion and Media session. Presenter: Wen Nie Ng
The goal of the paper is to enhance the metadata standard of fashion collections by expanding the controlled vocabulary and metadata elements for Costume Core, a metadata schema designed specifically for fashion artifacts. Various techniques are employed to achieve this goal, including identifying new descriptors using word embedding similarity measurements and adding new descriptive terms for precise artifact descriptions to use when re-cataloging a university fashion collection in Costume Core. The paper also provides a sneak peek of the Model Output Confirmative Helper Application, which simplifies the vocabulary review process. Additionally, a survey was conducted to collect insights into how other fashion professionals use metadata when describing dress artifacts. The survey results reveal 1) commonly used metadata standards in the historic fashion domain; 2) sample metadata respondents use; and 3) partial potential metadata that can be appended to Costume Core, which is relevant to Virginia Tech's Oris Glisson Historic Costume and Textile Collection. The expanded Costume Core resulting from the project offers a more comprehensive way of describing fashion collection holdings/artifacts. It has the potential to be adopted by the fashion collections to produce metadata that is findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable.
VRA 2023 Adventures in Critical Cataloging session. Presenters: Sara Schumacher and Millicent Fullmer
This paper will cover the results of a research study looking at visual resources professionals' perceptions of the visual canon at their institutions and their actions confronting biases in their visual collections. This research is innovative because the "visual canon" as a concept is often evoked but rarely defined, and there has not been research into perceptions and practices that span different types of cultural heritage institutions. The researchers seek to focus on the role of the visual resources professional as a potential change-maker in confronting bias and transforming the “visual canon.” In our presentation, we will discuss the analysis of our survey and interviews around three key research questions: What barriers do visual resources professionals perceive in remedying the biases in the visual canon? What authorities, past and present, do they identify in shaping the visual canon? How do they approach teaching users to identify and critically confront these issues? We will highlight trends as well as unique concerns and solutions from our research participants and engage our audience with how these issues impact their own collections, policies, and instruction.
VRA 2023 Beyond the Classroom: Developing Image Databases for Research session. Presenter: John J. Taormina
The Medieval Kingdom of Sicily Image Database project collects historic images of the medieval monuments of South Italy, from the so-called Kingdom of Sicily dating from c. 950 to c. 1430, during the Norman, Hohenstaufen, Angevin, and early Aragonese periods. The project was begun in 2011, as part of a 3-year Collaborative Research Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, under project investigators Caroline Bruzelius, Duke University, and William Tronzo, University of California, San Diego.
The site features over 8,000 historical images in a range of media, including drawings, paintings, engravings, photographs, and plans and elevations culled from museums, archives, and libraries in Europe and America, often from the Grand Tour, as well as from available publications. The value of the database lies in making accessible to scholars the visual documentation of changes to historical sites because the medieval monuments of South Italy have been damaged, changed, and restored on many occasions, with tombs and liturgical furnishings often destroyed, dismantled, or removed. In fact, many of the 600 monuments no longer exist, often bombed during World War II or destroyed in earthquakes, or obscured by modern buildings and urban sprawl.
VRA 2023 Archives Tools and Techniques session. Presenters: Maureen Burns and Lavinia Ciuffa
The Ernest Nash collection documents ancient Roman architecture in pre- and post-World War II Italy. What made Nash's work significant, beyond capturing the present state of the ancient Roman monuments at a volatile historical moment, was the primacy of the topographical photography and the systematic order he brought to this subject. The American Academy's Photographic Archive contributed Nash's images to an open access, interactive website called the "Urban Legacy of Ancient Rome." It reveals the city in stunning detail and uses geo-referencing to provide the viewer with a better understanding of the overall contextual and spatial logic. These Nash images and metadata are also IIIF compatible. As the Academy continues to digitize and describe the full collection of about 30,000 images, thanks to the generous support of the Kress Foundation, a new partnership has developed with Archivision and vrcHost. Current high quality digital photographs of the same ancient Roman monuments are being added to compare with the historical images documenting architectural changes--whether conserved, restored, altered, reconstructed, re-sited or destroyed. This presentation will provide a progress report about what it takes to move new digital photography into IIIF and the various tools available for close examination and presentation. Finding ways to provide ready access and juxtapose historic and contemporary photography online, builds upon the legacy of Nash's quality curation and scholarship to create 21st century, accessible, online educational resources of great interest and utility to scholars, students, and a wide audience of ancient Roman enthusiasts.
VRA 2023 Exploring 3D Technologies in the Classroom session. Presenter: Amy McKenna
Amy McKenna (Williams College) discusses her project that uses Photoshop and cardboard 3D glasses to recreate the 19th-century spectacle of a historic glass stereo collection.
VRA 2023 Keynote. Presenter: Melissa Gohlke
A historical record that focuses on white, heteronormative society and events obscures many facets of San Antonio history. Peel back the veneer of normalcy and one can find rich, diverse, and unexpected strands of the city’s past. From female impersonators of the early 1900s to queer life in derelict spaces during the 1960s and finally, gay and lesbian bar culture of the1970s and beyond, the hidden threads of San Antonio’s history reveal themselves. In this presentation, LGBTQ Historian Melissa Gohlke explores these hidden histories and stitches together an alternative interpretation of the city’s historical narrative by examining a wealth of primary sources found in archives and personal collections.
About the speaker:
Melissa Gohlke is an urban historian who specializes in San Antonio LGBTQ+ history. For over a decade, Gohlke has been researching queer history in San Antonio and South Texas and sharing her passion for this history through extensive outreach activities such as presentations, media interactions, exhibits, and written work. Gohlke is the Assistant Archivist for UTSA Libraries Special Collections.
About the VRA:
The Visual Resources Association is a multidisciplinary organization dedicated to furthering research and education in the field of image management within the educational, cultural heritage, and commercial environments.
VRA 2023 Beyond the Classroom: Developing Image Databases for Research session. Presenter: Mark Pompelia
Material Order is an academic consortium of material sample collections (including wood, metal, glass, ceramic, polymers, plastics, textiles, bio-materials, etc.—any material that might be used in or considered for art, architecture, and design disciplines) founded by the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University and Fleet Library at Rhode Island School of Design and now comprising several more institutions in the US. It provides a community-based approach to management and access to material collections utilizing and developing standards and best practices. Material Order created the Materials Profile that serves as a shared cataloging tool on the LYRASIS CollectionSpace platform and can be further developed as the different needs of consortium members are identified. Open Web searching across all collections occurs via a front-end discovery portal built with Wordpress at materialorder.org.
The Material Order project was born from the acknowledgment that resource sharing and collaborative catalogs are the most promising approach to exploration and implementation. It was always the intent, now actualized, for partner institutions with different mission and scope to compel the project to consider and accommodate criteria such as material health ecologies, fabrication possibilities, and overlap into adjacent fields such as engineering and archeology. Thus, Material Order represents not just items on a shelf but a knowledge-base of compositions, uses, forms, and properties. No longer in its infancy, Material Order provides a shared and adaptable framework for managing collections across the consortium and optimal facilitation of materials-based research and exploration for art, architecture, and design applications.
VRA 2023 New Frontiers in Visual Resources session. Presenters: Meghan Rubenstein and Kate Leonard
The Art Department at Colorado College is piloting a Personal Archiving program in select undergraduate studio courses that combines visual and digital literacy instruction with personal reflection and professional development. Meghan Rubenstein, Curator of Visual Resources, and Kate Leonard, Professor of Art, will discuss the drive behind this initiative to develop student competencies within a liberal arts setting. We will share our ongoing iterative process as well as select student activities and learning outcomes that may be adopted to various institutions.
VRA 2022 Teaching Visual Literacy session. Presenter: Molly Schoen
Our everyday lives are more saturated in images and videos than any other time in human history. This fact alone underscores the need to implement visual literacy skills in all stages of education, from pre-K to post-grad. Learning how to read images with critical, analytical eyes is crucial to understanding the world around us as we see it represented in the news, social media, advertisements, etc. New technologies have exasperated this already urgent need for visual literacy education. Synthetic media, deepfakes, APIs, bot farms, and other forms of artificial intelligence have many innovative uses, but bad actors also use them to fan the flames of disinformation. We have seen the grave consequences from this age of disinformation, from undermining elections to attempts to delegitimize science and doctors, undoubtedly raising the death toll from the COVID-19 pandemic. What do we need to know about these new forms of altered images made by artificial intelligence? How do we discern between real, human-made content versus fakes made by computers, which are becoming more and more difficult to discern? This paper aims to raise awareness of how new forms of visual media can manipulate and deceive the viewer. Audience participants will learn how to empower themselves and their peers into being more savvy consumers of visual materials by understanding the basics of AI and recognizing the characteristics of faked media.
VRA 2022 Individual Papers Session. Presenter: Malia Van Heukelem
This case study of a large artist archive at a medium sized academic research library will connect the success of the artist serving as his own archivist and the collection's broad research appeal locally, nationally and internationally. Like many artists, there is so much more than his own work represented. There is correspondence, fine art prints, ephemera of other artists and writers hidden in the collection. The foundation of organization is in place; now the focus is on creating online access points through finding aids and image collections. The presentation will explore the use of ArchivesSpace, Omeka, and other software to increase access. It will also demonstrate how a solo archivist can leverage interns, student assistants, and volunteers for collections management projects that benefit both the institutional priorities and desired learning outcomes. This talk will delve into the challenges of 20th century visual resource collections such as copyright and engagement with donors. Featuring a local artist has brought other art and architecture collections to the library, without clear boundaries which has led to questions of sustainability, who and what is collected. There is definitely a need to balance the historical record and yet, there are already more archival collections accessioned than can be responsibly managed by one person. The primary collection does include works by women and artists of color, yet much descriptive work remains to forefront the diversity contained within. As an archivist and librarian at a public university, there are many competing demands for collections management, support of researchers, and instruction plus the added interest for exhibition loans and the desire for other artists and architects to be represented. This artist archive is both interesting and complex.
This document summarizes an art history course titled "Pattern & Representation: Critical Cataloging for a New Perspective on Campus History" taught at Oklahoma State University. The course examines major developments in American art across different media from European contact through the mid-20th century. As part of the course, students are divided into groups to create digital exhibitions cataloging artworks from university newspaper archives between certain years. Students must include contextual information and link their entries to related articles. Their entries and a reflective essay are graded individually based on their work plan. The course introduces the concept of "critical cataloging" to bring social justice perspectives to archival and metadata work.
VRA 2022 session. Organizer/Moderator: Allan T. Kohl. Speakers: Virginia (Macie) Hall, Christina Updike, Marcia Focht, Rebecca Moss, Steven Kowalik, Jenni Rodda
During the past year, the “Great Resignation” (aka. The “Big Quit”) has roiled the world of employment nationwide in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, which had already caused job losses among our membership. While many institutions and individuals now hope for a “return to normal,” others anticipate that the past two years mark a watershed necessitating further transformational changes in the years ahead. These larger employment trends have come on top of quantum shifts in the visual resources field itself, as traditional tasks give way to new responsibilities, and siloed image collections are replaced by interdisciplinary projects.
For several years, our annual conferences have featured the perspectives of newer professionals in “Stories from the Start.” Looking at the opposite ends of their career arcs, this session brings together the perspectives and experiences of two pre-pandemic retirees, two of our members who made their decisions to retire during the past year, and two currently active professionals whose retirements are pending in the near future. When and why did they make their decisions to retire? What was/is the actual process? Concerns? What comes next after we leave our offices for the last time?
VRA 2022 Digital Art History session. Presenters: Melissa Becher and Samuel Sadow
In 2019, the art history program at American University gave its masters students a new option for the capstone project that is the culmination of the degree: create a digital project on an art historical topic using Omeka S or Wordpress. Initially, only a single student chose to complete a digital capstone over a traditional thesis, but within two years there was near parity between the two options, meaning seven digital capstones for the 2021 cohort. To support these projects, a close partnership quickly developed between the University’s library, the visual resources center, and the archives. This session covers how three campus units coordinate that support for these innovative digital humanities projects, including administration of the platforms, instruction, technical support, preservation, and access to the final projects. The session will also showcase examples of student work to demonstrate the variety and creativity of projects that can be accomplished using these platforms, as well as their contributions to the field of art history. The outcome of this initiative is clear: the best of digital humanities, weaving design and technology with rigorous art historical research, and finished projects that have already resulted in successful job applications in the field.
VRA 2022 Material Objects and Special Collections session. Presenters: Allan T. Kohl and Jackie Spafford
Materials-based collections represent a challenging new mode of information management in terms of subject specialization, physical description and accommodation, and institutional mission. Building upon the successful introductory meeting of this Group in Los Angeles at the 2019 Conference, the goal of this SIG is to provide a forum for open discussion of Material and Object Collections and their relationship to various library/visual resources tasks. The Material and Object Collections SIG provides an opportunity for individuals working with a variety of materials and objects collections – including those that support art and art history courses, those that support architecture and design courses, and those in cultural heritage organizations – to share ideas, issues, and potential solutions in regard to tasks similar to common library/visual resources activities (including cataloging, documentation, staffing, outreach), as well as more specialized concerns relating to the management of physical objects (security, storage and retrieval, the design of user spaces, etc.).
By continuing to offer an opportunity for participants to share brief introductions and profiles of their collections, we hope to encourage networking and exchange information about sources for specialized items; to display sample items and share surplus samples with other collections; and to provide examples of successful solutions to typical problems. Our long-range goal is to maintain an ongoing support group that can be of particular benefit to those professionals who are in the beginning stages of building or organizing physical collections.
VRA 2022 Digital Art History session. Moderator: Otto Luna
Exploration of visualization tools in the Digital Humanities/Digital Art History realm. Presenter: Catherine Adams
Assessing the use of Qualitative Data Analysis Software (QDAS) by Art Historians and Archaeologists. Presenter: Kayla Olson
Supporting Art History Students’ Digital Projects at American University. Presenters: Samuel Sadow and Melissa Becher
VRA 2022 Digital Art History session. Presenter: Kayla Olson
This paper discusses a study (completed in the spring of 2021) which explores how common the use of Qualitative Data Analysis software (QDAS) is among two kinds of object-based researchers: art historians and archaeologists. Surveys were disseminated in a snowball fashion and contained open and closed questions. The questions sought to give participants a platform to describe if, why, and how they use programs like Atlas.ti, NVivo, Dedoose, and MAXQDA throughout their research process. While not QDAS, the image management application Tropy was also included. The author hopes that the anonymized responses will prompt discussion among professionals in academic librarianship and visual resources management about the possible impact of these digital tools on researchers in these disciplines. The question remains on whether researchers in art and material culture disciplines would benefit more from QDAS if participants were aware of: 1) Their existence and 2) Their ability to help organize artifact data and to assist in performing image-based analysis.
VRA 2022 Critical Cataloging Conversations in Teaching, Research, and Practice session. Presenter: Ann M. Graf, Assistant Professor of Library and Information Science, Simmons University
In the field of information science, we strive to provide access to information through the most efficient means possible. This is often done through the use of controlled vocabularies for description of subjects, and, in the case of art objects, for the identification of styles, processes, materials, and types. My research has examined the sufficiency of controlled vocabularies such as the Art and Architecture Thesaurus (AAT) for description of graffiti art processes and products. This research is evolving as the AAT is responding to warrant for a broader set of terms to represent outsider art communities such as the graffiti art community. The methods used to study terminological warrant by examining the language of the graffiti art community are helpful to give voice to artists who work outside the traditional art institution, allowing the way that they talk about their work and how they describe it to become part of the common discourse. It is hoped that this research will inspire others who design and supplement controlled vocabularies for use in the arts to give priority in descriptive practice to those who have been historically underrepresented or made invisible by default use of terminology that does not speak to their experiences.
VRA 2022 Session. Presenter: Douglas Peterson
In 2021, the National Archives of Estonia engaged Digital Transitions’ Service division, Pixel Acuity, to build an Artificial Intelligence (AI) tool to analyze part of its historic record. The objective was to use this tool to enhance their collection with descriptive metadata that identified persons of interest in a collection of over 8,000 photographic glass plate negatives, a task that would ordinarily take years of human labor. In this presentation, we discuss our approach to accurately detecting and identifying human subjects in transmissive media, our initial findings using commercially available AI models, and the subsequent refinements made to our workflow to generate the most accurate metadata. In addition to working with commercially available AI models, we developed strategies for validation of AI-generated results without additional human supervision, and explored the benefits of building bespoke, heritage-specific AI models. By combining all of these tools, we developed a highly customized solution that greatly expedited accurate metadata generation with minimal human oversight, operated efficiently on large collections, and supported discovery of novel content within the archive.
VRA 2022 Community Building Session. Presenter: Dacia Metes
Queens Memory is an ongoing community archiving program that engages with our local communities in our two-fold mission to (1) push local history collections out to the public through programming and online resources, and (2) pull new materials into our collections from the diverse communities of Queens, NYC. The COVID-19 pandemic forced us to close our buildings, cease all in-person work and programming and shift our work to the virtual world. Our team quickly modified our processing workflow and asset tracking with the high volume of crowd-sourced donations coming through new online submission forms, set up in a rapid response to capture the stories coming from the pandemic’s first epicenter in the U.S. In my proposed conference session, I will discuss how we planned and managed the shift to fully online collection development. I will talk about our virtual outreach efforts to engage with the community and get them to contribute their materials, and how we developed the online tools and processes that allowed us to collect photographs, oral history interviews and other audio/visual materials, while also capturing the necessary metadata and consent forms. New internal communications channels, roles for volunteers, and triage processing for publication resulted from these efforts and are now essential parts of the team’s practices.
The document summarizes a workshop on accessibility guidance for digital cultural heritage collections. The workshop consists of two hours which include presentations on accessibility requirements and workflow strategies, a breakout activity where participants practice creating accessible descriptions for images, and a wrap-up discussion. The presentations cover topics such as common barriers to accessibility, guidelines for making images, video, audio and documents accessible, and best practices for incorporating accessibility into workflows. The breakout activity has participants work in groups to write alt-text and accessibility descriptions for sample images from online collections.
A workshop hosted by the South African Journal of Science aimed at postgraduate students and early career researchers with little or no experience in writing and publishing journal articles.
Exploiting Artificial Intelligence for Empowering Researchers and Faculty, In...Dr. Vinod Kumar Kanvaria
Exploiting Artificial Intelligence for Empowering Researchers and Faculty,
International FDP on Fundamentals of Research in Social Sciences
at Integral University, Lucknow, 06.06.2024
By Dr. Vinod Kumar Kanvaria
हिंदी वर्णमाला पीपीटी, hindi alphabet PPT presentation, hindi varnamala PPT, Hindi Varnamala pdf, हिंदी स्वर, हिंदी व्यंजन, sikhiye hindi varnmala, dr. mulla adam ali, hindi language and literature, hindi alphabet with drawing, hindi alphabet pdf, hindi varnamala for childrens, hindi language, hindi varnamala practice for kids, https://www.drmullaadamali.com
Thinking of getting a dog? Be aware that breeds like Pit Bulls, Rottweilers, and German Shepherds can be loyal and dangerous. Proper training and socialization are crucial to preventing aggressive behaviors. Ensure safety by understanding their needs and always supervising interactions. Stay safe, and enjoy your furry friends!
This presentation was provided by Steph Pollock of The American Psychological Association’s Journals Program, and Damita Snow, of The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), for the initial session of NISO's 2024 Training Series "DEIA in the Scholarly Landscape." Session One: 'Setting Expectations: a DEIA Primer,' was held June 6, 2024.
Introduction to AI for Nonprofits with Tapp NetworkTechSoup
Dive into the world of AI! Experts Jon Hill and Tareq Monaur will guide you through AI's role in enhancing nonprofit websites and basic marketing strategies, making it easy to understand and apply.
বাংলাদেশের অর্থনৈতিক সমীক্ষা ২০২৪ [Bangladesh Economic Review 2024 Bangla.pdf] কম্পিউটার , ট্যাব ও স্মার্ট ফোন ভার্সন সহ সম্পূর্ণ বাংলা ই-বুক বা pdf বই " সুচিপত্র ...বুকমার্ক মেনু 🔖 ও হাইপার লিংক মেনু 📝👆 যুক্ত ..
আমাদের সবার জন্য খুব খুব গুরুত্বপূর্ণ একটি বই ..বিসিএস, ব্যাংক, ইউনিভার্সিটি ভর্তি ও যে কোন প্রতিযোগিতা মূলক পরীক্ষার জন্য এর খুব ইম্পরট্যান্ট একটি বিষয় ...তাছাড়া বাংলাদেশের সাম্প্রতিক যে কোন ডাটা বা তথ্য এই বইতে পাবেন ...
তাই একজন নাগরিক হিসাবে এই তথ্য গুলো আপনার জানা প্রয়োজন ...।
বিসিএস ও ব্যাংক এর লিখিত পরীক্ষা ...+এছাড়া মাধ্যমিক ও উচ্চমাধ্যমিকের স্টুডেন্টদের জন্য অনেক কাজে আসবে ...
Strategies for Effective Upskilling is a presentation by Chinwendu Peace in a Your Skill Boost Masterclass organisation by the Excellence Foundation for South Sudan on 08th and 09th June 2024 from 1 PM to 3 PM on each day.
ISO/IEC 27001, ISO/IEC 42001, and GDPR: Best Practices for Implementation and...PECB
Denis is a dynamic and results-driven Chief Information Officer (CIO) with a distinguished career spanning information systems analysis and technical project management. With a proven track record of spearheading the design and delivery of cutting-edge Information Management solutions, he has consistently elevated business operations, streamlined reporting functions, and maximized process efficiency.
Certified as an ISO/IEC 27001: Information Security Management Systems (ISMS) Lead Implementer, Data Protection Officer, and Cyber Risks Analyst, Denis brings a heightened focus on data security, privacy, and cyber resilience to every endeavor.
His expertise extends across a diverse spectrum of reporting, database, and web development applications, underpinned by an exceptional grasp of data storage and virtualization technologies. His proficiency in application testing, database administration, and data cleansing ensures seamless execution of complex projects.
What sets Denis apart is his comprehensive understanding of Business and Systems Analysis technologies, honed through involvement in all phases of the Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC). From meticulous requirements gathering to precise analysis, innovative design, rigorous development, thorough testing, and successful implementation, he has consistently delivered exceptional results.
Throughout his career, he has taken on multifaceted roles, from leading technical project management teams to owning solutions that drive operational excellence. His conscientious and proactive approach is unwavering, whether he is working independently or collaboratively within a team. His ability to connect with colleagues on a personal level underscores his commitment to fostering a harmonious and productive workplace environment.
Date: May 29, 2024
Tags: Information Security, ISO/IEC 27001, ISO/IEC 42001, Artificial Intelligence, GDPR
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Find out more about ISO training and certification services
Training: ISO/IEC 27001 Information Security Management System - EN | PECB
ISO/IEC 42001 Artificial Intelligence Management System - EN | PECB
General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) - Training Courses - EN | PECB
Webinars: https://pecb.com/webinars
Article: https://pecb.com/article
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For more information about PECB:
Website: https://pecb.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pecb/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PECBInternational/
Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/PECBCERTIFICATION
ISO/IEC 27001, ISO/IEC 42001, and GDPR: Best Practices for Implementation and...
VRA 2013 Documenting the Art of Africa, Klein
1. Session 09:
Documenting the Art of
Africa: Creating New
Vocabularies
Thursday, April 4, 2013
Cataloging African Art
for Clarity and Context
Debbie Klein
Yoké Mask, Baga, Guinea
Photograph by Michael Huet
Huet, Michel. The dance, art, and ritual of Africa. Pantheon,
c1978., pl. 24
3. • Creating new vocabularies
• Using narrow and broad terms
for subject and worktypes
• Cataloging ephemeral events
• Fragment vs. whole
Female and male Pórópya figures overlooking the log shelter, kpaala, in the central square at the funeral of an elder
Photograph by Anita Glaze, 1970
Lamp, Frederick John, ed. See the music, hear the dance : rethinking African art at the Baltimore Museum of Ar. Prestel, 2004, p. 30
4. Work Type: shirt, ceremonial costume, costume
Culture: Bamana, Mande, West African
Title: Hunters Shirt with basi, or secret things
Description: Hunters's shirts accumulate basi, or
secret things, including amulets, claws, horns, and
other found objects, to represent the knowledge
acquired by the hunter over the course of his
lifetime. Only the hunter knows the contents of the
packets, and no other person is ever allowed to
wear the shirt, so personal are its secrets. (Nooter,
p. 104)
Materials: cloth, leather, cowrie shells, found
objects, mirrors
Creation location: Mali
Subjects: Magic; Power; Folk Art; Ethnic costume;
Amulets; Cosentino, Henrietta, Numu Tunkara
wearing hunters shirt, 1976
Nooter, Mary. Secrecy: African Art that Conceals and Reveals. Museum for African Art, c1993, p. 104.
5. Work Type: documentary photograph, black-and-white
photograph, photograph
Culture: Mende, Mande
Date: 1976
Photographer: Henrietta Cosentino (American, 1941-)
Title: Numu Tunkara wearing hunters shirt
Description: The hunter's life is dedicated to acquiring
knowledge, kept as a closely guarded secret, which is
reflected in the depth of accumulation on his shirt. The
collection on a hunter's shirt include amulets, tusks, mud,
leather, and more, representing prayers, power, spells,
and knowledge of plants of animals. (McClusky, p. 74)
Citation: Pamela McClusky. Art from Africa: Long Steps
Never Broke a Back. Lund Humphries, c2002.
Subjects: Rites and ceremonies; Magic; Power; Amulets;
Talismans; Indigenous peoples
McClusky, Pamela. Art from Africa: Long Steps Never Broke a Back. Lund Humphries, c2002, p. 74
6. Work Type: face mask, mask (costume), costume
Culture: Kuba, Central African
Title: Female mask (Ngady Mwaash)
Description: This mask personifies the wife of the
ancestral king Woot who is represented by the mask
Mwaash Mbooy. These masks tell the origin story
during a Kuba Bushoong masquerade that honors
tradition and heritage during funeral ceremonies.
Source:
http://www.artsconnected.org/resource/40088/ngady
-mwaash-mask (accessed 3/18/13)
Discovery location: Kinshasa (Democratic Republic of
the Congo);
Repository: Baltimore Museum of Art (Baltimore,
Maryland, USA) ID: BMA 1954.145.77
Subjects: Geometric patterns; Ritual and ceremonies;
Spirits; Ancestor figures; Masquerades; Cosmology;
Funeral rites and ceremonies
Lamp, Frederick John, ed. See the music, hear the dance : rethinking African art at the Baltimore Museum of Ar. Munich: Prestel, 2004, p. 172
7. Sample entry for a subject term authority record showing cataloger’s notes:
Not in AAT, but a very useful term. dk
Ancestors are believed to affect the fertility and fortune of the living in several ancient and
modern cultures in Africa, South Pacific, and South America.
As ancestor figures these sculptures were passed down through the family. They were cared for by
family elders who kept the figures in shrines within their compounds and made frequent offerings
to them for the well-being of the family and its lineage. The figure's powers could be heightened
by being anointed with magical medicines and they were used in a number of ways: to protect the
sick from evil forces, villages from unwelcome intruders and to ascertain the guilt, or otherwise, of
a defendant.
http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/a/a-tabwa-ancestor-figure/
The peoples of the coasts and islands of Cenderawasih Bay in northwest New Guinea formerly
created korwar, figures that portrayed recently deceased ancestors. ...Korwar images served as
supernatural intermediaries, allowing the living to communicate with the dead, who remained
actively involved in family and community affairs. When a family member died, his or her relatives
summoned a carver, typically a religious specialist, who created a korwar and enticed the spirit of
the deceased to enter it.
Source: Ancestor Figure (Korwar) [Cenderawasih Bay, New Guinea, Papua (Irian Jaya) Province,
Indonesia] (2001.674) | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art
8. From the Getty Research Institute Art & Architecture Thesaurus® Online
http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/vocabularies/aat/index.html
Costume (Hierarchy Name)
costume (mode of fashion)
<costume by function>
masks (costume)
body masks
fiber masks
leaf masks
ceremonial masks
Bifwebe
face masks
kpeli-yehe
fiber masks
helmet masks
horizontal masks
horned masks
leaf masks
nimba
plank masks
9. NgadyMwaash performs at a funeral for an initiated man
Photograph by Patricia Darish and David Aaron Binkley, 1982
Lamp, Frederick John, ed. See the music, hear the dance : rethinking
African art at the Baltimore Museum of Ar. Munich: Prestel, 2004, p. 173
10. Egungun ensemble
Yoruba, West Africa
UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History Los
Angeles, California, USA
FMCH X96.3.7
Drewal, Henry John. Beads Body and Soul: Art
and Light in the Yoruba Universe, Los Angeles:
UCLA Fowler Museum, 1998, p. 270
11. McClusky, Pamela, Art from Africa: Long Steps Never Broke a Back. Seattle, Wash.: Lund Humphries, c2002, p. 22
12. Cataloging a complex, time-based event
Event?
Masquerade?
Photograph?
McClusky, Pamela, Art from Africa: Long Steps Never Broke a Back. Seattle, Wash.: Lund Humphries, c2002, p. 22
13. Work Type: documentary photograph,
photograph
Date: 1994
Photographer: Henning Christoph (American,
1944-)
Title: Yoruba Egungun mask dancing
Description: Egungun is a part of the Yoruba
pantheon of divinities. The Egungun represents
the "collective spirit" of the ancestors.
Citation: Pamela McClusky. Art from Africa:
Long Steps Never Broke a Back. Lund
Humphries, c2002.
Technique: color photography
Subjects: Costume (mode of fashion);
Religious; Ancestor worship; Culture/Ritual;
Events; Masquerades; Ancestor figures; Body
masks; Yoruba
14. “Theses objects [in the museum] are but fragments of a larger, integrated form of art as it
generally seen in Africa. …
When we see the same objects in their original contexts … we realize that a museum display is
quite antithetical to their original nature.”
- Frederick John Lamp
See the Music, Hear the Dance: Rethinking African Art at the Baltimore Museum of African Art
Lamp, Frederick John, ed. See the music, hear the dance : rethinking African art at the Baltimore Museum of Art, Munich: Prestel, 2004, p. 244-245.
15. Goli Glen pair accompanied by a tre played by KalouYao, 1971
Photograph by Susan Mullin Vogel
Vogel, Susan Mullin. Baule: African Art, Western Eyes. Yale UP, c1997, p. 181
Yoké Mask, Baga, Guinea
Photograph by Michael Huet
Huet, Michel. The dance, art, and ritual of Africa. Pantheon, c1978., pl. 24
16. Work Type: documentary photograph
Culture: Baule, Akan
Date: 1971
Creator: photographer: Susan Mullin Vogel
(American, 1942-)
Title(s): Goli Glen pair accompanied by a tre played
by Kalou Yao
Description: The tre, a side-blown horn, is Goli Glen's
special instrument. Goli is a dance of Wan origin that
involves use of four pairs of masks. Goli Glen (or
GoliGlin) is the senior male mask in the series, also
called simply "Glen" (or "Glin.") (Vogel, p. 180)
Creation location: Kami (Yamoussoukro, Cote d'Ivoire)
Citation: Vogel, Susan Mullin. Baule: African Art, Western Eyes. Yale UP, c1997.
Subjects: Goli dance; Horns (animal materials); Aerophones; Helmet masks; Masquerades;
Ceremonial objects; Crowds; Audiences; Rituals (events); Dancers; Body masks; Fiber masks
17. Bibliography
Drewal, Henry John. Beads Body and Soul: Art and Light in the Yoruba Universe, Los Angeles: UCLA
Fowler Museum, 1998.
Huet, Michel. The dance, art, and ritual of Africa, New York: Pantheon, c1978.
Michel Huet. The dances of Africa, New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1996.
Lamp, Frederick John, ed. See the music, hear the dance : rethinking African art at the Baltimore
Museum of Art, Munich: Prestel, 2004.
McClusky, Pamela, Art from Africa: Long Steps Never Broke a Back. Seattle, Wash.: Lund Humphries,
c2002
Nooter, Mary. Secrecy: African Art that Conceals and Reveals, New York: Museum for African Art,
c1993.
Visonà, Monica Blackmun. A History of Art in Africa, New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2001.
18. Additional Reading: Sources for Cataloging African and African Diaspora Art
Anderson, Martha.G and Christine Mullen Kreamer . Wild spirits, strong medicine : African art and the wilderness. New York, N.Y. : Center
for African Art, 1989.
Bacquart, Jean-Baptiste. The tribal arts of Africa. Thames and Hudson, 1998.
Tanya Barson& Peter Gorschlüter eds. Afro modern : journeys through the Black Atlantic. Tate Liverpool, 2010.
Bassani, Ezio. Africa and the Renaissance : art in ivory. New York City : Center for African Art, 1988.
Suzanne Preston Blier. The Royal Arts of Africa: The Majesty of Form. H.N. Abrams, c1998.
David H. Brown. Santería enthroned : art, ritual, and innovation in an Afro-Cuban religion. University of Chicago Press, c2003.
Cole, Herbert M.,The Arts of Ghana. UCLA, c1977.
Cole, Herbert. I Am Not Myself: The Art of the African Masquerade.
Cole, Herbert. Icons : ideals and power in the art of Africa. Washington, D.C. : Published for the National Museum of African Art by the
Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989.
Cosentino, Donald J. Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou (UCLA Fowler Museum). U of California P, 1995.
Coquet, Michele and Jane Marie Todd. African Royal Court Art. U of Chicago P, 1998.
Crowley, Daniel J. African Myth and Black Reality in BahianCarnaval. UCLA Fowler Museum, 1984.
Henry John Drewal. Dynasty and divinity : Ife art in ancient Nigeria. Museum for African Art, c2009.
Drewal, Henry John. MamiWata : arts for water spirits in Africa and its diasporas. Fowler Museum at UCLA, 2008.
Drewal, Henry John . Yoruba : nine centuries of African art and thought. New York : Center for African Art in Association with H.N. Abrams,
1989.
Elleh, Nnamdi. African Architecture: Evolution and Transformation. McGraw Hill, 1996.
19. Flores-Peña, Ysamur and Roberta J. Evanchuk. Santeria Garments and Altars: Speaking Without a Voice. UP of Mississippi, 1994.
Foss, Perkins, ed. . Where gods and mortals meet : continuity and renewal in Urhobo art. Museum/African Art, c2004.
Galembo, Phyllis. Divine Inspiration: From Benin to Bahia. U of New Mexico P, 1993.
Galembo, Phyllis. Maske. Chris Boot Ltd., 2010.
Galembo, Phyllis and GerdesFleurant. Vodou: Visions and Voices of Haiti. Ten Speed Press, 1998.
Garlake, Peter. Early Art and Architecture of Africa. Oxford UP, 2002.
Grunne, Bernard de. The birth of art in Africa : Nok statuary in Nigeria. A. Biro, c1998.
Hahner-Herzog, Iris. African masks from the Barbier-Mueller Collection, Geneva . Prestel, c1998.
[Claudia Herrera]. The African presence in México : from Yanga to the present. Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum, c2006.
Historical Museum of South Florida. At the Crossroads: Afro-Cuban Orisha Arts in Miami. Historical Museum of S. Fla., 2001.
Huet, Michel. The dance, art, and ritual of Africa. Pantheon, c1978.
Jemkur, J. F. The Nok culture : art in Nigeria 2,500 years ago. Prestel, c2006.
LaGamma, Alisa,and John Pemberton. Art and Oracle: African Art and Rituals of Divination. HNA Books, 2000.
Alisa LaGamma, ed. Eternal ancestors : the art of the Central African reliquary. Yale University Press, c2007.
Frederick John Lamp, ed. See the music, hear the dance : rethinking African art at the Baltimore Museum of Ar. Prestel, 2004.
André Magnin, ed. Arts of Africa : Jean Pigozzi's contemporary collection. Skira, 2005.
Pamela McClusky. Art from Africa: Long Steps Never Broke a Back. Lund Humphries, c2002.
Morris, James. Butabu : adobe architecture of West Africa / James Morris ; text by Suzanne Preston Blier. Princeton Architectural Press, c. 2004.
20. Njami, Simon. Africa Remix: Contemporary Art of a Continent. Hayward Gallery, 2005.
Omari, Mikelle Smith. From the Inside to the Outside: The Art and Ritual of BahianCandomblé. UCLA Fowler Museum, 1984.
Perrois, Louis. Ancestral art of Gabon : from the collections of the Barbier-Mueller Museum. The Museum, 1985.
Phillips, Tom, ed. Africa : the art of a continent. Prestel, 1995.
Picton, John and John Mack. African Textiles: looms, weaving and design. British Museum Publications for the Trustees of the British Museum,
1979
Roberts, Allen F., Mary Nooter Roberts, Gassia Armenian, and OusmaneGueye. A Saint in the City: Sufi Arts of Urban Senegal. UCLA Fowler
Museum, 2003.
Schildkrout, Enid. African reflections : art from northeastern Zaire. U of Washington P, c1990.
Tamagni, Danielle. Gentlemen of Bacongo. London Trolley Ltd, 2009.
Thompson, Robert F. Face of the Gods: Art and Altars of Africa and the African Americas. Prestel, 1993.
Vogel, Susan, et al. Art/artifact : African art in anthropology collections. Center for African Art, 1988.
Vogel, Susan. Africa Explores: Twentieth Century African Art. Center for African Art, 1991.
Vogel, Susan Mullin. Baule: African Art, Western Eyes. Yale UP, c1997.
Wahlman, Maude. Signs and symbols : African images in African-American quilts. Studio Books, 1993.
Alvia J. Wardlaw, curator. Black art ancestral legacy : the African impulse in African-American art. Dallas Museum of Art , c1989.
22. http://www.paleobree.com/page7.htm
http://www.nganga.org/
http://www.folkways.si.edu/video/africa.aspx
http://www.folklife.si.edu/resources/maroon/presentation.htm
Note: Explore the Smithsonian’s Folkways site for music, video, interviews, etc.
http://www.barbier-mueller.ch/collections.html?p=home&lang=fr
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/afar.2008.41.1.13_2
http://exploringafrica.matrix.msu.edu/teachers/curriculum/
http://academic.csuohio.edu/curnowk/curnowk/html/aronson.html
http://www.ezakwantu.com/Gallery%20Trade%20Beads%20Slave%20Beads%20African%20Currency.htm
http://www.ondostate.gov.ng/culture_heritage.php
http://lucy.ukc.ac.uk/YorubaT/yt1.html
http://www.jamaicamix.com/JamaicaCultureAndHeritage/JamaicanTraditionalDances.html
http://www.historyfiles.co.uk/MainFeaturesAfrica.htm
Editor's Notes
NOTE: My talk was about cataloging copywork so all of my images were copyrighted. Unfortunately, the images were a big part of the talk. However, I have cited them all in full, if you are interested. There is also a bibliography for the talk at the end, and I have added suggestions for further reading as well as some links. Please email me if you have any questions or would just like to talk cataloging: klein@bard.edu.Talk begins here:At the Visual Resources Center at Bard College, I catalog African art for the African Studies department as well as for several art history courses on African and African diaspora art and culture. I am going to talk about how you can put African art in context through your cataloging.
I catalog in IRIS, a relational database developed at Brown University. The cataloging examples I will be showing are based on VRA-Core and CCO We use authority files primarily from the Getty Research Institute and the Library of Congress.
The key to cataloging African art is to place it in its cultural context. I am going to talk about ways to do that through: Creating new vocabularies and using narrow and broad terms.I will also discuss how to catalog ephemeral events.I will talk about why individual examples of African art should be considered as fragments of a whole. This is a 1970 photograph by Anita Glaze. These Senufo ancestor figures are guarding an elder’s body during mourning rituals.
My first example is a Bamana hunter’s shirt from Mali. What kind of shirt is this? Who made this? What are those things hanging on the shirt? Our cataloging record needs to supply the context that would make this image comprehensible.At the most basic level, this is a shirt, but it is not about fashion, it's a ceremonial shirt. In my record for this shirt, I use the narrow terms as well as the broad terms. The Bamana are a Mande people. This narrow culture term is a clue about the shirt’s past life. An interested student can search the term Bamana to learn about the people who made this shirt.My title tells us more about the object:Hunter’s Shirt with basi, or secret things.This title suggests the deeper life of the object. But What are the secret things? Adding a short description allows us to further understand what we are looking at.I add a detailed list of materials. The creation location locates the culture geographically. The subjects are primarily search terms. But they can also point the way to further research. When we train students at Bard to search for images, we tell them to look at the subjects to find terms to use for additional searching. Using broad terms cast a wider net for searches. I like the thought of serendipity. When one search can motivate a second, or deeper search. We sometimes use the subject fields to refer to related records.For instance, you’ll note that I’ve included the title of another work in our collection, a photograph by Henrietta Cosentino, of a hunter wearing his shirt.
Shown here. This image has a different description that complements the description in the cataloging record of the previous image. I try not to repeat descriptions. African concepts are too complicated, and translations too imprecise, to compress the whole of cultural belief into a couple of sentences. Attaching different descriptions to related work records allows our understanding to accumulate as we look at successive records. I have cited the source for the description. Since the source book information is displayed in full in the record, I use the abbreviated form, and simply reference the author and the page number.
My next example is a NgadyMwaash mask. I’ll just quickly run through this record and then I will talk about vocabularies. By the way, this is not the complete record, I’ve left out general information like dates. Dates are usually over a broad range as these cultures don’t tend to keep records. Kuba is a narrow term, a Central African culture group. The generic English title aids quick comprehension. However, the African title is the specific name for this type of mask. Most of these traditional forms will look very similar no matter who was the craftsman. They are meant to be the same, generation after generation. It is about tradition and continuity, rather than creativity. However, each type of mask is different from the other and each perform a very specific function. To speak only of a female mask is meaningless. Back to our cataloging. Note the discovery location. When available, noting the specific place where the object was created makes the mask that much less impersonal. I used the term discovery location rather than creation location because I don't know for sure that the mask was made in the same place where it was it was collected. Many of these names have different spellings from book to book or website. You can put the second title in your alternative title field, if you have one. You can add it after the first in parentheses. Or you can work into your description. In this description, I have not added an alternative term but a more narrow one. I have used the more narrow culture term Bushoong. It’s not in AAT but I did run across it in connection with these masks on several reputable online sources In this case, I got this description from an online source, which I noted here. We do paraphrase for brevity’s sake. We rely on online sources to supplement our knowledge and for verification. We try to only use scholarly sources. Now I want to talk more about expanding your vocabulary and using narrow terms. Subjects are not only search terms, but can also provide clues to the object’s meaning and use. We use the Getty and Library Congress vocabularies. If a term is important, and we can find reputable sources, we will add work types and subjects to our authority tables. We routinely add names, but we try to be more selective when adding other authorities.
For instance, here is an example of a subject record I made for the term ancestor figures. This term is not in AAT, but is a useful term, as they occurs in many cultures across the world. I created a work type term, using two reputable online sources. Note that I did not try to write a description. I used the descriptions from two online examples to establish a precedent.
I have found that the Getty vocabularies are a very good resource for African terms. I used the narrow term face mask for the mask I just showed you. Here is a section of the terms the Getty AAT defines under mask. You see it includes terms that are very specific to certain cultures. As inanimate objects these are masks, which are technically a form of costume. Of course, these masks transcend the usual Western definition of costume. When they are danced, these masks cease to be a costume worn by a dancer and become the living presence of the spirit. This is one reason it is always good to show an image of the mask in action.
Here is NgadyMwaash animated. This introduces my next topic. How to catalog an ephemeral, time- based event. I am going to introduce a new mask for this next record.
This an Egungun mask in the Fowler Museum. It is beautiful thing.
But you can see how it comes to life when danced. How do we catalog this?
Keep in mind that the fields in a cataloging record should consistently refer to the same object. If you try to catalog this image as a mask, both you and the record quickly get confused. The only date I have is the one when the photo was made. Where do I put that? This image is not just about the mask. It is also about the crowds watching, the movement, the location outside. In short it is about the whole cultural context. You could catalog it as an event, or preferably the more narrow term, masquerade. But that still doesn't cover the photographer. Remember that CCO says that we should ask the question “What is it?” The most specific answer is that this is a photograph created to document an aspect of African culture.
This is a documentary photograph of an Egungun dance, taken in 1994 by Henning Christoph. The photographer is important because often the documentation of these events has been done by a well known scholar of African art. This can be another research clue.For instance, Henning Christoph is a photojournalist who authored a book called Soul of Africa Magical Rites and Traditions. The creation location and date of the photograph also tell us when and where the event was taking place. You use the title, and the description and the subject fields to elaborate on the cultural context, which is the subject of the photograph. You have seen how these masks are always part of a greater cultural ritual. They are not made to be displayed.
When masks and other objects are treated as isolated art objects they become separated from the purpose for which they were created. This head is a beautiful sculpture. But it was not made to stand alone like this. It has a very serious purpose. It represents the spirit of a deceased oba, or king, as a deity. Together with the other objects on this shrine, it represents direct contact with the spiritual world. These shrines answer the supplications of the living, control powerful forces, and maintain the power of the community. In the past, humans were sacrificed to these king shrines. This pristine head is completely divorced from the complex and powerful cultural practice represented by this shrine image. If you are only cataloging an object such as this head, if you can, take the time to add a line or two in the description field that suggests its cultural context. By the way, I cataloged this shrine as a photograph, since the shrine exists in time as well as space. These shrines are ephemeral. They change over time as they are used.
To review I’ll use a photograph by Susan Vogel of a Goli Glen masquerade.
Use specific, narrow terms along with general, broad terms. Place the object in context, both culturally and geographically. If there is more than one example of a particular type of object, vary the descriptions in each record so that they complement each other and add to the understanding of the object. When cataloging an isolated object, such as a mask in a museum, use the description field to place it in the context of the whole. When cataloging a photograph of an event or other ephemeral object, catalog it as a photograph and use the description and subject fields to elaborate. With this record, the source book gave me a lot of very specific information. I was able to include the specific place and date. I could also include the name of the musician, Here, Kalou Yao, who is playing the tre, a horn. It is explained here in the description field. To conclude.Background information deepens our understanding of any artwork, but especially so when we are looking at art produced by an unfamiliar culture. When cataloging African art it is important to remember that these objects are a fragment of a greater cultural context. Use narrow and broad terms, use the African terms in the record fields when you can; and try to include a sentence or two in the description field that places the object in context.