ARLIS/Mountain West in Tucson

I was able to attend the ARLIS/ Mountain West conference in Tucson, Nov. 11-14, 1999. After an opening reception at the pueblo-revival style Joesler House (owned by the University of Arizona), sessions began with "High and Low Tech in Museum Libraries" presented by Genni Houlihan (Phoenix Art Museum Library) and Nancy Simon (Dever Art Museum Library). Retrospective conversion activities and challenges of working with volunteers were highlighted.

Tara Carlisle's presentation "C'est Chic: The Texas Fashion Collection as a WWW Resource" was next. Her excellent presentation was another version of the material she discussed at our Chapter meeting in Fort Worth (see http://www.art.unt/tfc for more details). During the business meeting, I announced our chapter's Mexican membership sub-committee and asked for assistance from members with contacts in Mexico. Museum librarians responded that they would contact their Latin American art curators and ask for names of colleagues in Mexico. Next year's chapter meeting will be in Salt Lake City and Las Vegas was mentioned for 2001. They also discussed proposing Las Vegas for the 2004 ARLIS/NA conference.

The next session was "Making Technology Work," presented by Lise Hawkos and Heather Seneff of Arizona State University's School of Art Visual Resources Collection. Lise and Heather reviewed the history of technological changes in their collection from a DataEase database in 1984 to their current web site http://www.asu.edu/cfa/art/facility/artslide. Low resolution images have been made available for "virtual slide reviews" since 1997, with text provided by the professor (syllabus notes) or imported from their database. They created a worksheet, allowing work-study students to input most web site functions. They use a Nikon digital slide scanner, Image Access Pro, MS Access, and an in-house server. In 1999 they began an MFA Archive Project which includes students' artists' statements and resumes linked to images of their work (72 d.p.i., for temporary classroom use; not archival or permanent, and unsuited for other media). Recently faculty have begun to teach using broadcast TV, incorporating digital images in PowerPoint presentations, and creating class web pages. Visual Resources Curators place scans into PowerPoint for faculty, trading slide carousels with zip drives. They purchase digital image sets and follow the VRA Image Collection Guidelines and the AAM's Museum Guide to Copyright and Trademark. With each source record they create they include rights information (permission letters are prepared with slide orders). Smart Classrooms are being installed and the School of Art established an Art History Classroom Technology Committee. Lise and Heather expressed a need for two new staff lines: someone to handle rights & reproductions and someone to manage scanning and digital projects.

Next came "Applying Constructivist Learning Theory to Library Instruction" led by Ann Lally (University of Arizona Library). This was an active learning session: we were placed into small groups, given an assignment, and asked to report back to the larger group. When we were done we found out that we had a constructivist learning experience! Generally these are broken down into 6 parts: a situation, groupings, a bridge, questions, exhibits, and reflections. More information is located at http://www.prainbow.com/cld.cldp.html. The day ended with keynote speaker, folklorist Jim Griffith, entertaining us with lore and slides of Hispanic Tucson and Mexicana Arizona.

Our second day began with a presentation by Tom Riedel (Regis University) on "Tradition Reconfigured: Juan Sanchez and Patrocino Barela and New Deal Saint-Making." This talk was based on Tom's M.A. thesis and a chapter he wrote for a forthcoming book on colonial identity in New Mexico. While Tom described his research on artists Juan Sanchez and Patrocino Barela, he gave us an insight into the history of American folk art exhibitions and publications, santo collecting (and their removal from churches), and the commissioning of reproductions of 18th-19th century retablos, santos, and bultos by the Federal Arts Project.

Artist Fritz Scholder followed with a presentation on his book arts, prints, and poems, and read from his latest work: "Millennium." The meeting ended with R. Brooks Jeffery (Arizona Architectural Archives) and Jim Griffith providing us with an informative tour of Tucson architecture, yard art, murals, and other roadside attractions. I urge all chapter members to attend a Mountain West conference as I found this one very informative. Sessions were chosen after a "call for papers" was issued, and attempts are made to include papers dealing with library management and administration, technology issues, art and architecture topics.