Visual Resources Division
Saturday, March 7, 1998 10:30-12:00

As incoming Moderator, Leigh Gates, Art Institute of Chicago, called the
meeting of the Visual Resources Division (VRD) to order in the absence of
Martha Mahard, who was unable to attend due to an illness in her family.
Leigh read a letter from Martha expressing her regrets, her thanks to Trudy
Jacoby and Margaret Webster for their support on the Visual Resources
Advisory Committee, and her wishes for a stimulating conference.

Old Business and Reports

Christine Bunting, new moderator of the Visual Resources Advisory Committee
(VRAC), reported on  the year's activities, which included the liaison with
the Conference Planning Advisory Committee in order to assure that visual
resource issues were well-represented in the Philadelphia conference
program. She urged the VRD membership to run for the ARLIS Executive Board
in order to continue our representation at the policy-making level of the
Society. She informed the division that the VRAC was initiating a survey of
professional issues, including salaries, development opportunities,
staffing, and professional qualifications, which would be included in a
future joint ARLIS/VRA publication, "Professional Guidelines for Visual
Resources." Christine voiced the concern of the committee over the future
availability of significant slide sets such as the Arts of America set
originally produced by Sandak through a Carnegie grant.

At this point, Maryly Snow reported on the very latest developments in her
attempt to track down the disposition of this slide set. It had just been
announced that Simon & Schuster, current owner of Sandak, was once again up
for sale. She will continue to pursue the matter of making this set
available for further educational use. In addition, the VRAC will write a
letter of concern to Simon & Schuster or any future owner of Sandak.

Katy Pool,  co-chair of the Public Policy Committee, reported on the
considerable activity of that committee in tracking copyright legislation
and initiatives over the past year. ARLIS/NA had not endorsed the CONFU
"Proposal for the Educational Fair Use of Digital Images," which now enters
a testing period. After due consideration and recommendation by the Public
Policy Committee, the ARLIS/NA Executive Board had endorsed the National
Humanities Alliance (NHA) "Basic Principles for Managing Intellectual
Property in the  Digital Environment" in 1997.

Legislative activity was briefly outlined, including H.R. 2281, the WIPO
Copyright Treaties Implementation Act; H.R. 2652, the Collection of
Information Antipiracy Act; and H.R. 3048, the Digital Era Copyright
Enhancement Act. The intent and provisions of these bills can be found on
the ARLIS web site under "News" at
http://libraries.mit.edu/rvc/arlisna/digital.html.  Katy reiterated the
effectiveness of a grassroots letter-writing approach and urged VRD members
to take advantage of sample letters included on the ARLIS web site. The
Public Policy Committee was commended for its efforts in keeping the
membership informed through their timely Action Alerts over the listserv.

Members were urged by a recent attendee of the town meeting covering
"Copyright Law in the Digital World: Fair Use, Education and Libraries
after CONFU (The Conference on Fair Use)" that we must be proactive in
forming the future of intellectual freedom. A statement indemnifying
librarians at Indiana University is one such example of seizing the
initiative.

Elisa Lanzi, as chair of the VRA Data Standards Committee, reported that
the "Core Categories for Visual Resources, Version 2.0"  are now available.
These standards are intended as guidelines for describing visual documents
depicting works of art, architecture, and artifacts or structures from
material, popular, and folk culture. The VISION (Visual Resources Sharing
Information Online Network) project is the first attempt to create an
application using the "Core." VISION  is a collaborative project of the VRA
and the Research Libraries Group (RLG), with support from the Getty
Information Institute. Beginning in late 1997, a group of 32 contributors
began creating records using a template based on the "Core."

Elisa informed the meeting that an up-coming issue of the VRA Bulletin will
be devoted to data standards.

Margaret Webster, as an Executive Board member, reminded VRD members that
all budgetary requests and conference proposals must be made by May 31,
1998. She also urged everyone to return their conference evaluation forms.

As VRA liaison to the Conference Planning Advisory Board, Margaret reported
on conference planning decisions for Philadelphia, which included an
overlapping day of programming with VRA, and a successful joint welcome
party and members art exhibition. She pointed out that a fruitful dialog
has been opened between ARLIS and VRA for conference programming and
planning as we look forward to 2001. VRA, meeting  in Los Angeles in 1999
February 9-13, offers another opportunity for a joint session. ARLIS
members will receive a members discount on registration fees. Finally,
Margaret encouraged joint participation at the chapter level.

Wearing her hat as an ARLIS Membership Committee member, Christine Bunting
reported that the proportion of visual resource professionals in ARLIS has
been falling, while membership in the VRA has been rising. Attracting and
retaining visual resource membership in ARLIS has been a continuing concern
in recent years. Christine reminded members that a summary of benefits of
becoming an ARLIS member had been posted on the VRA-L this past year.
Specialized membership reporting is now available from ARLIS headquarters
by making requests through Margaret Webster.

Announcements

The new Vice-Moderator of the VRD for 1998-1999 will be Marty Stein from
the Houston Museum of Fine Arts. She will post a statement of purpose on
the VRD-L after the conference.

Leigh Gates reminded VRD members of the VRA Nancy DeLaurier Writing Awards
Program, which will now accept previously published papers for submission.

Linda Bien was thanked for continuing to serve as listmaster of the VRD-L,
which will be revived soon after the conference closes. Leigh will update
the mailing list, and post announcements and reports.

At this point, Kathryn Wayne, as Vice President/President Elect, introduced
herself to the group, and offered her efforts at facilitating any VRD
projects or concerns.

New Business

A call for session proposals for the 1999 ARLIS/NA conference in Vancouver,
March 25-31, was made. Elisa Lanzi anticipated proposing a session on data
standards, which might be sponsored by the VRD. Discussion ensued on
several sessions proposed by Eileen Fry, which might examine subject
indexing past, present and future. These sessions might be co-sponsored by
the Cataloging Section and the VRD.

The remainder of the meeting was devoted to animated discussion focused on
forming an "Image Conservancy," an idea proposed by Katy Poole and Maryly
Snow. Such a conservancy might provide an image bank, appropriately
archived and administered, of significant collections in danger of becoming
lost or unavailable. An ad-hoc committee was proposed by Leigh to look into
the feasibility of forming such a conservancy by studying the legal,
financial, and logistical issues involved. A call for participation from
interested members will be made after the conference.

There being no other new business or time to discuss it, the meeting was
adjourned.

Respectfully submitted,
Leigh Gates
Art Institute of Chicago
lgates@artic.edu

Bien, Linda 			Concordia University
Bunting, Christine			University of California, Santa Cruz
Burns, Maureen			University fo California, Irvine
Clarke, Sherman 			New York University
Dufresne, Daphne 			Université du Québec a Montréal
Duncan, Norine 			Brown University
Fry, Eileen 			Indiana University
Gates, Leigh 			Art Institute of Chicago
Hardin, Paula			Louisiana State University
Hehman, Jennifer			Indiana University-Indianapolis
Jacoby, Trudy 		 	Trinity College
Kieffer, Libby			Clarke Art Institute
Krupanski, Pam			Tufts University
Lanzi, Elisa 			Lanzi & Warren
Lawson, Roger			National Gallery of Art
Learned, Betsy Peck 			Roger Williams University
Narver, Lindy  			Beverly Hills Public Library
Nurse, Susan			Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester
Osegueda, Laura			North Carolina State University
Pearman, Sara Jane 			Cleveland Museum of Art
Poole, Katy			Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Snow, Maryly 			University of California, Berkeley
Stahl, Joan			National Museum of American Art
Wassermann, Mary			Philadelphia Museum of Art
Webster, Margaret 			Cornell University
White, Lynda 			University of Virginia
Whiteside, Ann 			Harvard Design School