This article traces the history of Canadian art publishing from the eighteenth century to date, closely paralleling the development of art historical scholarship in the country. A statistical survey of art publishing 1975–80 is followed by details of recently published key works in the fields of architecture, sculpture, painting, drawing, graphic arts, folk decorative arts, photography, North American Indian and Eskimo art. A substantial bibliography is appended. This paper was delivered to the Section of Art Libraries at the 1982 IFLA Council in Montreal.

Art librarians share a passion for art and a determination to solve the practical problems of art librarianship. They may be brought together initially by the desire to overcome their isolation, but once together they achieve corporate strength. Art librarians have formed associations since 1924, but with gathering momentum since the late 1960s, culminating in the creation of an international association within IFLA. ‘Internationalism’ in the arts should mean a celebration of, and interaction between, distinctive national and regional cultural traditions. Five suggestions are put forward for consideration by any national art libraries association.

• 1) The inclusion within the association of every type of art librarian and art library.

• 2) An examination of the provision of art documentation in the country as a whole, paying particular attention to documentation of the country’s own art (including design, crafts, folk art and popular culture).

• 3) A consideration of the country’s art library collections and services as a whole, and of their potential as an integrated network.

• 4) Participation in international co-operation and in the activities of the IFLA Section of Art Libraries.

• 5) The development of members’ awareness of the ideals and objectives of art librarianship.

(The text of a paper presented to a meeting of ARLIS Norge at Oslo on January 25th 1984).

The history of art libraries in Canada, in the context of the development of the study of Canadian art history is explained. A brief description of the background and scope of important libraries in the categories public, university, architecture, art school, and art gallery and museum libraries is provided. This paper was delivered to the Section of Art Libraries at the 1982 IFLA Council in Montreal.

This article challenges the history and interpretation of the visual arts of Africa promulgated by much of the documentation on African art found in British art libraries — both that based on the colonial archaeological, ethnographic and anthropological approach, and that stemming from the influence of African arts on early twentieth century European art. Drawing parallels between the false picture of African history produced by colonial historians, and the perception of African art history by non-African art historians, the author draws attention to the need for Africans to document their own art, and to the lack of documentation on the contribution of Black artists to British cultural life.

The author is a South African artist and writer living in Britain, who will be exhibiting with the Midlands Art Group, Nottingham, January – February 1984. The article is a revised version of a paper delivered at the ARLIS/UK course ‘Visual art documentation for a multi-cultural society’, held on 11 November 1983 at the Commonwealth Institute, London.

Fluxus is a radical art movement, started by George Maciunas and others in 1962, which is still having a profound effect on advanced art movements of the 1970s and 1980s. By using excerpts from publications; an early essay by George Brecht; and unpublished letters by George Maciunas to several artists drawn from the collection of Gilbert and Lila Silverman, we are able to trace the development of Fluxus publishing concepts and also sense the political foundation of the movement. The article is prefaced by Gilbert B. Silverman’s introductory remarks on the formation and purposes of his collection.

This article describes the background to and present existence of photographic collections in the UK, and attempts to create a co-ordinated policy for acquisitions and recording, culminating in the National Photographic Record and the publication of the Directory of British Photographic Collections. The implications of various recent pieces of legislation for the future of photographic collections are considered, and proposals for a ‘National Photographic Archive’ utilising aspects of the new technology are outlined. This paper was first delivered at the Royal Society of Arts, London, on 17 November 1982, and subsequently published in the Royal Society of Arts Journal vol. CXXXI, no. 5318, January 1983.

The Courtauld Institute of Art, London, has a slide collection dating back to 1932. Begun with lantern slides, it converted to 35mm. format in the 1950s and became an independent department in 1964. This article traces its history and growth, covering aspects such as acquisition, indexing, accommodation, staffing and use.

The article provides an outline of the background and development of the profession of art librarianship in Canada, concentrating particularly on CARLIS and its forerunners. The activities, projects, publications and future plans of CARLIS are described. This paper was delivered to the Section of Art Libraries during the 1982 IFLA Council in Montreal.

In the 1970s the Sächsische Landesbibliothek formulated policies for the collection and documentation of archival material in the fine arts. Based on a rich existing collection, the Library was able to expand its acquisitions programme by systematic searching and soliciting of material. The scope and some of the specific strengths of the collection are described, as are those of the Akademie der Künste der DDR and the archive of the National-Galerie der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin. The article has been translated from the original German by Vera Kaden and Tom French.

Optical videodisc technology is a very effective tool for art research, archival preservation and the presentation of visual materials. In fact, this new technology has the potential to revolutionise the current methods of conducting research and the storage and retrieval of art documentation. There are, however, many issues concerning videodisc technology which should be identified before disc can become a practical reality for the art world.

This paper outlines:

(1) How a videodisc works, including specific advantages and limitations of the technology for the field of art librarianship, and, (2) How the videodisc may be applied to visual resources and art documentation from the collection manager’s point of view. Various art related videodisc projects completed between 1980 and 1983 will be used as illustrations, and the videodisc done at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA) will be used as a case study.

The paper was delivered to the IFLA Section of Art Libraries, Munich, 1983.

An outline of the project for a computerised index to the Witt Library in the Courtauld Institute of Art, this article is substantially a written version of the paper delivered at the ARLIS / UK Conference, Brighton, 1983.

Information technology has until quite recently tended to favor alphanumerics as the medium of communication. This emphasis on text militated against those application areas in which the visual image was a crucial factor. Recently, technical developments in two related fields have created a fresh potential for incorporating the visual image into large-scale information systems, namely linking computer databases with optical videodiscs. As a consequence, design, architecture, and both the fine and the graphic arts have become state-of-the-art application topics in the area of large-scale data storage and retrieval technology. This paper reports on two case studies one based in modern architecture (ARCHFILE), and one based on the work of a particular artist. (PICAS-SOFILE). It was first delivered to the IFLA Section of Art Libraries, Munich, 1983.

Iconclass is a classification of subjects, themes and motifs in Western art. It was developed and published in Holland, at the University of Leiden, with financial aid from both the Netherlands Organisation for the Advancement of Pure Research (Z. W.O.) and the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Iconclass is used in a growing number of projects, whether computerised or not. One of these projects could be the Witt Library pilot project, discussed elsewhere in this issue of the Art Libraries Journal (pp. 27-31).

In this paper the classification as such is briefly explained, mainly with the help of two examples: scenes from the stories of St. Antony Abbot and Hercules. Information on the alphabetical index to the classification is given, mainly because this extensive part of Iconclass is something more than the usual index to a publication.

Applications of the classification are dealt with in diagrammatic form; one application, the Iconclass bibliography, is discussed in greater detail.