Primary Research Group

Creating the Digital Art Library, 2013 Edition Primary Research Group

This monograph profiles the digitization efforts of eight North American university art, architecture, and design libraries. Conducted in the summer of 2013, the interviews shed light on a wide range of programs and initiatives, exploring the challenges library heads have faced and the successes they have experienced in digitizing their collections. Interview subjects open up concerning their digitization endeavors, including what's being digitized, and covering their experiences with commercial image collections such as ARTstor, the challenges of digitizing in-house against the prospect of outsourcing such work, potential licensing and copyright issues, marketing the library's digital collections via social media, equipment and staff matters, priorities, and more. The results represent a broad spectrum of digitization efforts in art libraries today, from the newly-initiated to the well-seasoned veteran. The following institutions are represented in the report: Cornell University; University of Cincinnati; University of Houston; Washington State University; University of Manitoba; University of Florida; Santa Fe University of Art and Design; and University of Chicago.