A slide library is a library that houses a collection of photographic
slides, either as a part of a larger
library
A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a vir ...
or photo archive, or standing alone within a larger organization, such as an academic department of a college or university, a museum, or a corporation. Typically, a "slide library" contains slides depicting
artwork,
architecture
Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...
, or cultural objects, and is typically used for the study, teaching, and documentation of
art history
Art history is the study of aesthetic objects and visual expression in historical and stylistic context. Traditionally, the discipline of art history emphasized painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, ceramics and decorative arts; yet today ...
, architectural history, and visual culture. Other academic disciplines, such as
biology
Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary i ...
and other sciences, also maintain image collections akin to slide libraries. Corporations may also have image libraries to maintain and document their publications and history. Increasingly, these types of libraries are known as "Visual Resources Collections," as they may be responsible for all "visual" materials for the study of a subject and include still and moving images in a variety of physical and virtual formats. They may contain:
* 35mm slides
* lantern slides
* mounted study photographs
* born digital images
* 35mm, 8mm film
Many educational institutions have changed the names of their slide libraries over the years, to a variety of titles like Visual Resources Center, Imaging & AV Center, Digital Collections Center, etc. The titles and duties of slide librarians have therefore expanded greatly. As keepers of these important historical images, visual resources librarians have continuously
cataloged and
inventoried slide collections, circulated them to faculty for teaching, and more recently,
digitized slides and placed them online via
content management systems
A content management system (CMS) is computer software used to manage the creation and modification of digital content (content management).''Managing Enterprise Content: A Unified Content Strategy''. Ann Rockley, Pamela Kostur, Steve Manning. New ...
.
History of visual resources collections
The first American
lantern slide
The magic lantern, also known by its Latin name , is an early type of image projector that used pictures—paintings, prints, or photographs—on transparent plates (usually made of glass), one or more lenses, and a light source. Because a sin ...
collections, developed by
museum
A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make thes ...
s to reflect and augment their collections, got their start between 1860 and 1879: the American Natural History Museum, the New York State Military Museum, the Smithsonian Institution, and the Winterthur Museum. American colleges and universities began their collections during the same period of time:
DePauw University
DePauw University is a private liberal arts university in Greencastle, Indiana. It has an enrollment of 1,972 students. The school has a Methodist heritage and was originally known as Indiana Asbury University. DePauw is a member of both the ...
,
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
,
Oberlin College,
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...
,
University of Rochester
The University of Rochester (U of R, UR, or U of Rochester) is a private university, private research university in Rochester, New York. The university grants Undergraduate education, undergraduate and graduate degrees, including Doctorate, do ...
. Colleges and university collections were used primarily for classroom instruction.
The first illustrated architectural history course west of the
Mississippi
Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...
was John Galen Howard's Architecture 5A-F at the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
in 1905. The six-semester course was required for all architecture students, and like other architectural history courses of its time, at
MIT
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...
and
Cornell
Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach a ...
at least, were multi-year in duration. Of course, the lecture was illustrated by lantern slides. In the U.S., lantern slides generally measured 3"x 4.25".
The 1950s was a period of transition from black and white lantern slides, which heretofore had often been hand colored, to color positive film. Lantern slides were shot directly onto color film, and the 35mm slide (2"x2" with an image of 24mm x 36mm) gained in popularity.
The heyday of the lantern slide lasted one hundred years, more or less, from 1860 to 1960. The reign of the 35mm slide, more or less, was about half as long, fifty years, 1955–2005.
Timeline: Development of visual resources (collections and profession) in the U.S.
1865. First lantern slide collections begin developing in the U.S. These 3.25" x 4.0" glass slides projected clearly with great detail. However, projectors required
lime light which was dirty and dangerous
1887. First transparent, flexible nitrocellulose film base developed
1888. First perforated film stock developed
1889. Eastman combined nitrocellulose film stock, perforated edges, and dry-gelatino-bromide emulsion to create the first paperless film stock
1902. Court denies Eastman's exclusive patent, allowing any company to develop 35mm film
1905. UC Berkeley’s Architecture Library acquires its first lantern slide, the tree of architecture, made from Banister Fletcher’s book, ''A History of Architecture on the Comparative Method''
1909. 35mm adopted as the international standard gauge by Motion Picture Patents Company, an Edison trust
1913. 35mm film format introduced into still photography
1925. Leica Camera introduced, using 35mm still film
1930. Safety film introduced (cellulose diacetate)
1934-1936. Kodachrome 35mm slide film introduced, but not widely adopted by colleges and universities. Film stock was either flammable or brittle
1949. Kodak replaces all nitrate-based films with its safety film, a cellulose-triacetate base
1952. All camera film is now triacetate based, paving the way for widespread adoption of 35mm film in both amateur and academic markets
1952+ American faculty widely divided in their allegiances to lantern slides for their clarity or to 35mm slides for their ease of production and transport to class. Huge debates begin about whether 35mm color film is stable enough for adoption and whether the loss of clarity will ruin the teaching of art history. Younger faculty adopt 35mm film, while older faculty prefer lantern slides
1968. Visual resources curators begin meeting during annual College Art Association (CAA) conferences
1969. Art Libraries Society, established in the United Kingdom and Ireland, founded
1969. The first "universal" classification system published by
Luraine Tansey and Wendell Simons under the title, ''A slide classification system for the organization and automatic indexing of interdisciplinary collections of slides and pictures''
1972.
Art Libraries Society of North America
The Art Libraries Society of North America (also known as ARLIS/NA) was founded in 1972. It is an organization made up of approximately 1,000 art librarians, library students and visual resource professionals.
Activities
ARLIS/NA organizes activ ...
(ARLIS/NA) founded by a group of art librarians attending the American Library Association annual conference in Chicago
1972. Nancy DeLaurier organizes the visual resources curators of Mid-America College Art Association
1974. ''Slide libraries; a guide for academic institutions and museums'', by Betty Jo Irvine. Published by Libraries Unlimited for Art Libraries Society
1974. ''Mid-America College Art Association slides and photographs newsletter'' begins publishing under the leadership of Nancy DeLaurier
1974. ''Slide buyer's guide'', revised edition, edited by Nancy DeLaurier, published by University of Missouri-Kansas City, "for The College Art Association of America". Limited to 500 copies
1976. ''Slide buyer's guide,'' 3rd edition, edited by Nancy DeLaurier, published by the College Art Association
1978. ''Guide for Photograph Collections'', edited by Nancy Schuller and Susan Tamulonis, published by MACAA/VR
1978. ''Guide to Equipment for Slide Maintenance and Viewing'', edited by Gillian Scott, published by MACAA/VR
1979. ''Slide libraries : a guide for academic institutions, museums, and special collections'', by Betty Jo Irvine with assistance from P. Eileen Fry. Libraries Unlimited
1979. ''Guide for the Management of Visual Resources Collections'', edited by Nancy Schuller and published by MACAA/VR (Mid-America College Art Association Visual Resources Committee)
1980. ''Guide to Copy Photography for Visual Resource Collections'', edited by Rosemary Kuehn and Arlene Zelda Richardson, published by MACAA/VR
1980. ''Standard for staffing fine arts slide collections'', by the Ad-hoc Committee on Professional Standards for Visual Resources Collections
1980. ''Slide buyer's guide'', 4th edition, edited by Nancy DeLaurier, published by Mid-America College Art Association, Visual Resources Committee
1980. ''MACAA slides and photographs newsletter'' reborn as the ''International Bulletin for Photograph Documentation of the Visual Arts''
1980. ''Visual Resources: an international journal of documentation'' launched by Helene Roberts, published by Iconographic Publications
1980. Art and Architecture Thesaurus project launched to provide subject access for art and architecture
1982-1983. Visual Resources curators from MACAA/VR, CAA, and ARLIS/NA launch
Visual Resources Association
The Visual Resources Association (also known as VRA) is an international organization for image media professionals.
VRA was founded in 1982 by slide librarians (visual resources curators) who were members of the College Art Association (CAA), t ...
(VRA)
1983. ''Standards for art libraries and fine arts slide collections'', published as Occasional Paper No. 2 of ARLIS/NA
1985. ''Slide buyers' guide : an international directory of slide sources for art and architecture'', 5th edition, edited by Norine Duncan Cashman, index by
Mark Braunstein, published by Libraries Unlimited as part of their Visual resources series
1986. Sara Shatford Layne publishes "Analyzing the Subject of a Picture: A Theoretical Approach"in Cataloging and Classification Quarterly, vol. 6(3)
1987. Toni Petersen, President of ARLIS/NA, urges the Visual Resources Division, to begin developing some standard authorities for shared cataloging
1988. Barneyscan, first dedicated 35mm slide scanner, introduced
1989. Visual Resources Association launches its bulletin
1990. ''Art and Architecture Thesaurus'', Toni Petersen, editor, published by Oxford University Press in 3 volumes. Critical step in providing subject access to individual 35mm slides in visual resources collections
1990. ''Slide buyers' guide : an international directory of slide sources for art and architecture'', 6th edition edited by Norine Duncan Cashman, published by Libraries Unlimited, Visual resources series. At head of title: Visual Resources Association
1990. ''Beyond the Book: Extending MARC for Subject Access'', edited by Toni Petersen and Pat Molholt, by G.K. Hall. Several papers on visual resources, including : "Access to Diverse Collections in University Settings: the Berkeley Dilemma", by
Howard Besser and Maryly Snow, and "Visual Depictions and the Use of MARC: A View from the Trenches of Slide Librarianship", by Maryly Snow
1990.
Tim Berners-Lee starts work on a hypertext graphical-user-interface (GUI) and makes up the name World Wide Web as the name for the program
1991. ''Facilities Standards for Art Libraries and Visual Resources Collections'', edited by Betty Jo Irvine. Published by Libraries Unlimited for ARLIS/NA
1991. ''World Architecture Index: a Guide to Illustrations'', compiled by Edward H. Teague, published by Greenwood Press as part of its Art Reference Collection No. 12
1991. Visual Resources Association creates its listserv, VRA-L, a vital communication tool for its visual resources curators members
1992. ''Users' Guide to The Art and Architecture Thesaurus'', published along with the electronic edition by Oxford University Press
1993. Visual Resources Association established its Data Standards Committee
1994. March. Marc Andreessen leaves National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) to found the Mosaic Communications Corp, later becomes Netscape. Mosaic launches the World Wide Web for the general public
1994. September. First image database, SPIRO, debuts on the World Wide Web
1995. ''Concordance of Ancient Site Names'', edited by Eileen Fry and Maryly Snow, published as Topical Paper No. 2 of ARLIS/NA (see 1987 call for visual resources authority work). This is one of the first scholarly authorities created by visual resources curators for visual resources cataloging
1995. ''Criteria for the Hiring and Retention of Visual Resources Professionals'' adopted by the executive boards of both ARLIS/NA and VRA
1996. ''Art and Architecture Thesaurus Sourcebook'', edited by Toni Petersen, published as Occasional Paper No. 10 of ARLIS/NA
1996. Staffing Standards for Art Libraries and Visual Resources Coillections, published as Occasional Paper No. 11 of ARLIS/NA
1996. VRA Core 1.0 release
1998. Vision Project, sponsored by Research Libraries Group. First shared cataloging project with 32 visual resources collections cataloging and sharing images. Vision Project also served as a test of VRA Core 1.0
1998. VRA Core 2.0 release
1998. ''ArtMARC Sourcebook: Cataloging Art, Architecture, and Their Visual Images'', edited by Linda McRae and Lynda White, published by American Library Association
2000. ''Guidelines for the Visual Resources Profession'', edited by Kim Kopatz. A joint publication of ARLIS/NA and VRA
2000. ''Collection Development Policies for Libraries and Visual Collections in the Arts'', compiled by Ann Baird Whiteside, Pamela Born, Adeane Alpert Bregman, published as Occasional Paper No. 12 of ARLIS/NA
2001. VRA Copy Photography Computator (for determining intellectual property restrictions and fair use) release
2002. VRA Core 3.0 release
2002. ''Criteria for the Hiring and Retention of Visual Resources Professionals'' updated, and adopted by ARLIS/NA, VRA, and College Art Association
2004.
ARTstor
Artstor is a nonprofit organization that builds and distributes the Digital Library, an online resource of more than 2.5 million images in the arts, architecture, humanities, and sciences, and Shared Shelf, a Web-based cataloging and image manageme ...
image database, a project of the Andrew Mellon Foundation, is available for licensing. ARTstor combines finding, organizing, and presenting images in one integrated software environment
2004. Kodak discontinues manufacturing its 35mm carousel projectors and carousels. This sends a strong signal to American professors that the time to switch from 35mm slides to digital images is now
2004. North American Lantern Slide Survey begun, jointly sponsored by ARLIS/NA and VR
2005. VRA Core 4.0 Beta release
2006. ''Cataloging Cultural Objects'' published by American Library Association. Edited by Murtha Baca, Patricia Harpring, Elisa Lanzi, Linda McRae, Ann Baird Whiteside on behalf of the Visual Resources Associatio
2007. VRA Core 4.0 release
External links
Visual Resource Collections:
Slides and Digital Images, Fine Arts Library of the Harvard College LibraryArchitecture Visual Resources Library, Architecture Department, University of California, BerkeleyVisual Resources Center, Rice University, Houston, TexasVisual Resources Collection, College of Built Environments, University of Washington, SeattleImaging Center, Smith College, Northampton, MassachusettsRoger Williams University Visual Resources Center, Bristol, Rhode IslandVisual Media Center, Duke University, Durham, North CarolinaVisual Resources Collection, School of Architecture, The University of Texas at AustinVisual Resources Collection, Department of Art History, Ithaca CollegeVisual Resources Collection, Fine Arts Library, The University of Texas at AustinUniversity of Michigan, Department of History of Art, Visual Resources Collections
Image Databases:
*
Artstor, ARTstorbr>
*
Digital Public Library of America
The Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) is a US project aimed at providing public access to digital holdings in order to create a large-scale public digital library. It officially launched on April 18, 2013, after two and a half years of dev ...
br>
Visual Resources Center, Pratt Libraries, list of databasesNorth Carolina State UniversityOxford University
How to Digitize Slide Libraries:
Scanning slides, Dartmouth College LibraryWorkflow, Ball State UniversityGrant proposal, Fisher Fine Arts Library, University of PennsylvaniaBest practices, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of UtahBasics of Scanning, Library of Congress
Professional Organizations:
The Visual Resources Division (VRD) of Art Libraries Society of North America (ARLIS/NA)Art Libraries Society of North America (ARLIS/NA)Visual Resources Association (VRA)Visual Materials Section, Society of American Archivists
{{DEFAULTSORT:Slide Library
Architectural history
Art history
Libraries by type
Photography
Types of library