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Art libraries for the people

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 June 2016

Clive Phillpot*
Affiliation:
Museum of Modern Art, New York
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Abstract

Basing his arguments on Ranganathan’s tenets of librarianship, the writer challenges art librarians to question many of their attitudes to users, and the effect of these on the universal availability of art documentation, from the ‘user friendliness’ of libraries, through practical techniques of librarianship which assist users, to implications for interlibrary co-operation worldwide. This is a slightly revised version of a paper delivered to the IFLA Section of Art Libraries Preconference in Chicago, August 1985.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Art Libraries Society 1985

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References

1 The phrases ‘art library’, ‘art librarian’, etc. are used in this text merely as convenient ways of referring to bibliothecal entities pertaining to human visual invention, and should not be taken to imply limited terms of reference. See my earlier text: “The Social Role of the Art Library’. Art Documentation, vol. 2, no. 6, December 1983, p.177, for more on this topic, as well as for discussion of other concerns which intertwine with those incorporated in the present text.Google Scholar
I would also like to thank Philip Pacey for letting me read his text: ‘The Universal Availability of Art Publications: a Global ContextArt Libraries Journal, vol. 10, no. 3, Autumn 1985, pp. 727, before it was delivered at the IFLA meeting in Chicago in August 1985. I benefitted from his insights, and they have informed this text.Google Scholar
2 Ranganathan, S.R. The five laws of library science. 2nd edition (amended). Bombay, etc.: Asia Publishing House, 1963. First published 1931. p.26.Google Scholar
3 ibid. p.80.Google Scholar
4 ibid. p.81.Google Scholar
5 ibid, p.258.Google Scholar
6 ibid, p.287.Google Scholar
7 ibid, p.326.Google Scholar
8 Gurnsey, John. Access to information: Third World loses out to Western resources. Library Association Record, vol. 86, no. 8, August 1984, p.301.Google Scholar
9 Jost, Karl & Heusser, Hans-Jörg. Interview with Lutz Heusinger, Director of the ‘Bildarchiv Foto Marburg’. AICARC Bulletin, vol. 11/12, no. 21/22, 1984/1985, p.18.Google Scholar