Overview
With the proliferation of information on the World Wide Web and in other networked environments, there are many users that search for images of works of art and architecture. End-users generally try to search for images by subject, a process that often proves unsatisfactory and frustrating. Cataloging images of works of art has always been challenging, but now that end-users need only have access to the Internet, the challenge is more daunting than ever. This illustrated book on using metadata standards and controlled vocabularies to catalog and provide end-user access to images of works of art also focuses on decisions that must be made about the arrangement of visual records, descriptive principles and methodologies, and requirements for access. Introduction to Art Image Access addresses the issues that underlie the intellectual process of documenting a visual collection to make it accessible in an electronic environment. A glossary, selected bibliography, and an annotated list of tools are included.
Synopsis
Four specialists in image cataloguing who work at major research institutions—the Getty, UCLA, the Index of Christian Art, and the U. of Oregon—have each submitted a thoughtful essay on the issues and possible solutions for creating databases that allow users to easily locate the images they seek. The definitions allotted to images, the complexities in defining images of other images, how one defines art image, the tasks ideally served by the cataloguer, and the methods and needs of the image database user are the topics considered. There is a glossary and bibliography, but no index. The volume is well illustrated, in b&w, with images from the Getty collection (where Baca heads the Standards Program). Annotation c. Book News, Inc.,Portland, OR