Hostname: page-component-7b7567c8c-wxvwp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-15T08:46:08.865Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Too much to look at, too much to read

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 June 2016

Trevor Fawcett
Get access

Abstract

When applied to the visual arts the concept of universal availability implies access to a massive and heterogeneous corpus of visual and archival material as well as printed texts. Achieving full bibliographic and iconographic control will be an enormous undertaking and may eventually become counterproductive. Universal availability also supposes the widest possible popular access to art, despite doubts sometimes expressed about the effects of overexposure. Community libraries have a special responsibility towards the general public’s visual education through targetted selection of printed and visual resources and through the encouragement of local art initiatives.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Art Libraries Journal , Volume 12 , Issue 3 , 1987, pp. 5 - 11
Copyright
Copyright © The Art Libraries Society 1987

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

1. Phillpot, Clive. “Art libraries for the people”. Art Libraries Journal, v.10 no.4 Winter 1985 p.3–11.Google Scholar
2. Pacey, Philip. ‘The universal availability of art publications: a global context”. Art Libraries Journal v. 10 no.3 Autumn 1985 p. 7–30; “International co-operation between art libraries 1: towards an international cooperative acquisitions scheme”. Art Libraries Journal v.11 no.2 1986 p.9–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
3. Art Journal 1862 p.61 and 109.Google Scholar
4. Freitag, Wolfgang. “Tapping a serviceable reservoir: the selection of periodicals for art libraries”. Art Libraries Journal v.1 no.2 Summer 1976 p.10–21.Google Scholar
5. Freitag, Wolfgang. “Co-operative collection development and resource sharing among art libraries: past and present”. Art Libraries Journal v.11 no.2 1986 p.19–32.Google Scholar
6. Borges, Jorge Luis. “The Library of Babel” in Fictions, ed. Kerrigan, A.. London, 1965.Google Scholar
7. Roberts, Helene E. “Visual resources: proposals for an ideal network”. Art Libraries Journal v. 10 no.3 Autumn 1985 p.32–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
8. The Athenaeum 1857 p.856–7.Google Scholar
9. Smith, Roger. “The rise and fall of the Art Unipn Print”. Print Quarterly v.3 no.2 June 1986.Google Scholar
10. Ruskin, John. The Works of John Ruskin, ed. Cook, E.T. and Wedderburn, A., 39 vols. London, 1903-12 v.22 p.471–2.Google Scholar
11. Wind, Edgar. Art and Anarchy. London, 1963 p.8–9.Google Scholar
12. Ibid. p.9.Google Scholar
13. Ibid. p.101.Google Scholar
14. Rosenberg, Harold. “Art books, book art, art” in The Anxious Object. Chicago, 111., 1966 p. 197–8.Google Scholar
15. Ibid.Google Scholar
16. Cited in Webb, W.L., “The end of the world is nigh”, The Guardian 2 December 1986.Google Scholar