Asia Art Archive was established in 2000 in Hong Kong to document and secure the multiple recent histories of contemporary art in the region. Built through a systematic programme of research and information gathering, it is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading public collections of primary and secondary source material about contemporary art in Asia, comprising hundreds of thousands of physical and digital items, searchable via its online catalogue. A growing selection of digitised material is now also available in the Collection Online.

The Library of the Victoria and Albert Museum has always collected primary source material. This consists of artists’ letters, diaries, sitters’ books and various personal papers. Or it may be material of a more general kind: inventories, bills, unpublished articles, recipes for paints and varnishes and similar items of use to the Museum departments or to other readers. Occasionally in the past we have been offered material relating to a firm, a person, or a society, which consisted of a mixture of printed matter, photographs, original drawings, manuscript letters etc., which, when received in the Museum, would be divided among the relevant departments — the Library and the Department of Prints and Drawings in particular. The Library continues to acquire manuscript material of the kind mentioned above, and indeed in the last two years has pursued an active policy in this field. As a result we have acquired such varied items as the wardrobe accounts of the Empress Josephine for 1809 (2 large boxes of them), a 16th century herald’s sketchbook, an unpublished history of jade, and a letter from Sir William Nicholson to Siegfried Sassoon agreeing to illustrate ‘Memoirs of a fox-hunting man’. A list of the English accessions is published annually, and all acquisitions are notified to the National Register of Archives. Most of the items were acquired by purchase (e.g. from booksellers’ lists or auction sales), but there have also been some welcome donations.

The slide collection at the Bibliotheque Forney is an extension of this library’s documentation of the decorative arts and crafts for the benefit of the craftsmen and public of Paris. The collection consists mainly of sets of slides, copies of which are available for loan.

Originally founded as the library of the British Museum, the British Library has since 1973 been the United Kingdom’s national library, and has increasingly played a leadership role in co-operation and the co-ordination of library services in this country. Responses to its 1998 Strategic Review emphasised the importance of the Library’s collections in underpinning its services to support scholarship and research. But the Library is no longer able to collect as extensively as in its early years. As part of the new partnership programme intended to optimise national provision the Library is keen to work closely with ARLIS/UK & Ireland, and with the institutions with collections of national importance in the visual arts, to identify research needs and patterns of use and to establish ways of collecting, preserving and providing access to material to meet those needs.

Electronic mail makes it possible to exchange ideas and texts, and to seek answers to problems or to reference queries, immediately and easily. BITNET, a network for e-mail communication between academic bodies, originated in the USA in 1981 and now links 49 countries. Within BITNET, a mail distribution service, LISTSERV, facilitates specialised networking including ARLIS-L, a network for art librarians initiated by ARLIS/NA and hosted by the University of Kentucky. ARLIS-L was launched in 1990 and currently connects some 650 subscribers in 14 countries, not all of whom are members of ARLIS/NA. Anyone with a modem, a phone line, a personal computer and an e-mail address can access ARLIS-L; for those affiliated with academic institutions, access to e-mail networks is likely to be already catered for and free of charge. Existing subscribers are very enthusiastic about the ARLIS-L service. [A complementary network, VRA-L, is in place for those specifically interested in visual collections. Editor.]

In general terms, this paper is about the possibilities newly available to art historians, because of the new cheapness, of computing, and the problems which still exist in the areas of data and image storage, retrieval and display. First it tries to assess the technology from a layman’s point of view, then ventures into the contentious matter of how many art historians (in these days of reduced funding) are either able or willing to take advantage (if there are advantages) of new technology. Threading throughout the paper are doubts about whether the use of computers can or will advance the study of the subject (as opposed to making that study easier), and about whether the finance for some of the hardware mentioned could ever be raised by any non-scientific department.

How do we define ‘the contemporary’, can we collect it, and if so, how should we do it? A look at some of the issues from the perspective of the Word & Image Department at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London argues for the primacy of the object over the digital surrogate, and investigates the challenges -and opportunities - involved in collecting or representing ‘boundary crossing’ art and design practice. The arguments are illustrated by a selection of recent acquisitions, ranging from book arts, multiples and ‘maps’, to prints, drawings and wallpapers.

The librarians of two important theatre libraries in the Russian Federation – the Russian State Art Library and the St. Petersburg State Theatre Library – here outline the histories of their institutions and give an idea of the coverage and use of their collections. They discuss how they are tackling the problems of preserving their unique material, much of it iconographic, and the principles by which they select contemporary acquisitions. They also consider the challenges and benefits posed by digital material.

Based on the acceptance of a future of continuing and accelerating change, this paper looks at the political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental issues which impact on us as art librarians, and looks back to see what lessons might be learned to help us deal with a future we cannot predict with any certainty.

The Union list of art, architecture and design serials, an online database of periodicals on fine and applied arts, film and television held by academic, public, national and special libraries throughout the UK and Ireland, has been some ten years in the making and work is still progressing. In autumn 2000 funding was obtained to allow for greater progress on this critical research tool, extending the coverage of participating libraries and enhancing the bibliographical records. However the work of increasing the level of participation in the Union list has largely been taken forward by direct approaches to individual institutions and by July 2002 there will be over 60 participating libraries as well as fuller bibliographic citations.

A selection of ‘avant-garde’ journals, from the early 20th century onwards, which have included architectural material. The journals are grouped into countries (which appear in alphabetical order), and are then arranged chronologically by date first published. Part 1 covers journals from Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary and Italy. The journals are described by a number of contributors denoted by their initials: A.B. (Antoine Baudin); J.G. (Jacques Gubler); M.D.G. (Manolo De Giorgi); B.H. (Brian Henson); I.P. (Isabella Pezzini); F.R. (Franco Raggi); P.G.T. (Piero G. Tanca).

The article is the translation of a survey ‘La rete delle riviste’ which first appeared in Rassegna, no. 12, December 1982 - a special issue entitled ‘Architettura nelle riviste d’avanguardia’.

The ABBA (Asociación de Bibliotecarios y Bibliotecas de Arquitectura, Construcción y Urbanismo) brings together about 50 librarians and 40 libraries of quite different types. There are university libraries, government libraries, and the libraries of associations of architects; there are large libraries with extensive resources, and small libraries with very small budgets. The only thing they have in common is their speciality (architecture, building and town and country planning) and the kind of user they serve (architects and architecture students.

“Informkultura” is an information system, for art and culture, based on the Lenin State Library, but involving other major libraries in the U.S.S.R. as well as national libraries and information centres in Eastern Europe, Cuba, and Vietnam. “Informkultura” disseminates information through regular publications, including bibliographic indexes and information bulletins, and a variety of information services. Currently, “Informkultura” is responding to the impact of “perestroika” and the ensuing demand, for, and democratisation of, information.

The historic site of the French national library is currently being renovated in order to become a major centre for art documentation and special collections. It will incorporate three separate institutions: the specialist departments of the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the library of the Institut national d’histoire de l’art, and the library of the Ecole nationale des Chartes. Completion of the project is scheduled for 2017.

In June 2006, just a year ago, in Paris – between the Seine and the Eiffel Tower – a new museum opened. The musée du quai Branly is dedicated to non-European arts and civilisations. At the heart of this museum is a médiathèque.

CADENS is a project based at the Institute of Art History at the University of Nijmegen. The intention is to provide comprehensive access to information on contemporary art contained in all Dutch 19th century art exhibition catalogues, by means of a computer database. Two publications, a directory of artists and a keyword index, are envisaged.

Art history in the Netherlands is supported by a number of art libraries in addition to museum libraries, among them the Royal Library at The Hague, the libraries of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and the Central Research Laboratory for Objects of Art and Science, both at Amsterdam, university libraries, and libraries of Dutch establishments abroad. The combined art collections of these libraries are considerable; access, however, may be facilitated by the Project for Integrated Catalogue Automation (PICA) which aims to improve on the diversity of existing catalogues.