Aaron White's Lis 640 White Paper

WHITE PAPER FOR THE CHEERWINE CONTEMPORARY PAINTING MUSEUMS
METADATA AND CATALOGING WORKSHEET
Aaron White
LIS 640: Organizing Library Collections
November 8, 2012
The Cheerwine Contemporary Painting Museum (CCPM),

located in Kannapolis, North Carolina, has drawn its
collection of paintings entirely from the work of the
diverse and cutting-edge painters anthologized in the books
Vitamin P1 and Vitamin P22, both from Phaidon Press. In many
ways these books can be credited with inspiring the creation
of the CCPM; they were compiled to highlight remarkable
painting in a variety of styles (abstract, representational,
surreal, collage, landscape, portrait) by current painters,
and were such an affirmation of current painting that the
curator used it as a shopping list.
These paintings need to
be cataloged, and Chief Curator Aaron White searched for a

metadata solution.
After some online research he found JISC
Digital Medias directory of Metadata Schemas and Related

Standards3, and reviewed its links to informational and
official websites about metadata schema relevant to museum
collection.
Mr. White also consulted the Vitamin P books
themselves to consider the information they provided on each

artist and artwork.
3
The format of Vitamin P, Volume One, is as follows:
each artist receives 2-4 pages, of which most page space is
devoted to reproductions of the artists work bordered by
white margins.
Each section begins, however, with text.
The artists name is printed first, in bold orange letters.

This is immediately followed by a brief (about 500 words)
essay that mingles biographical information about the artist
with subjective but informed critical commentary by one of a
variety of commentators.
The individual commentator is
named at the end of the essay.
Beneath this text-block is a
second text-block which begins with the artists birthplace,

year of birth, and current (as of printing) place of
residence.
Next in the text block comes Selected One Person
Exhibitions by year, name and location of each exhibition,

then Selected Group Exhibitions, and finally Selected
Bibliography, listing author, chapter/article title,
publication title and publication date.
The last text
before the images is citation of the images themselves. Each

image listing includes title (or untitled), year, medium
(ex. Acrylic on canvas), measurement in inches, and
measurement in centimeters.
The second volume, Vitamin P2, changes the format
somewhat.
Each section begins with a bio-critical essay,
4
and each paintings citation consists of title, year of
release, medium, and measurements in centimeters only.
All
the other information that, in the first volume, was

presented along with this text (e.g. birth year, places of
birth and residence, exhibitions and bibliography) has been
relocated to an appendix, allowing more page space for art
reproductions.
In adopting a metadata standard, CCPM would need to
consider ways to reflect the information the Vitamin P
editors have regarded as important.
Moreover, it will need
a way to encode the complex idiosyncrasies of modern

paintings.
These works range from abstraction, to
cartoonishness, to lush illustrative styling that the

artists of earlier centuries might have recognized as
painterly.
To reflect this, the metadata standard will
need to allow for nimble descriptions of each works

imagery, and will need to connect the catalog record to
image(s) of the work.
It seems unlikely that catalog
records without photographic reproductions of the work will

be sufficient.
CDWA Lite (Categories for the Description of Works of
Art) and VRA seem to be the front-runners for museum
metadata.
VRA, according to their JISC Standards Catalogue,
5
is widely used as the basis for metadata for art image
collections4 (http://standardscatalogue.ukoln.ac.uk/index/VRA) while CDWA Lites
stability and take-up is currently uncertain5
(http://standards-catalogue.ukoln.ac.uk/index/CDWA).
such, VRA will be the metadata standard.
As
VRA Core 4 permits
the linking of catalog entries with images5, and this is a

desirable quality, given the complexities of describing a
painting in text alone.
Of the vocabulary standards on offer via the JISC, most
are devoted to archival objects or bibliography.
The
vocabulary standards that aim most squarely at the museum

are CDWA and CCO.
Both are well established, but CCPM has
chosen to adopt CCO for the user-friendly clarity of its

instructions6.
Like the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame
up the street, the CCPM will rely on student/intern workers,

and needs to keep cataloging processes streamlined and easy
to learn; CCOs instructional materials make that easier
than CDWAs more complex instructional materials.
VRA Core
4 and CCO are both products of the Visual Resources

Association so the CCPM has chosen to take them as a set.
6
By cross-referencing the VRA Core 4 fields and XML
elements with the CCO categories, the following worksheet
fields were produced:
1. Title (corresponds to CCOs Title and VRAs work)
2. Artist (corresponds to CCOs Creator and VRAs name)(per
VRAs examples, first name first)
3. Measurements (corresponds to CCOs Measurements and VRAs
Measurements)(centimeters H. x W.)
4. Materials (corresponds to CCOs Materials and Techniques
and VRAs Material)
5. Nation (corresponds to CCOs Culture and VRAs Culture
Context)
6. Date (corresponds to CCOs date and VRAs Date (year
only))
7. Current Location (corresponds to CCOs current location
and VRAs location (for our purposes, CCPM on display,
CCPM in storage, or on loan from (name of institution)
would be key terms)
8. Subject (corresponds to CCOs subject and VRAs subject)
9. Work Type (Corresponds to CCOs class and VRAs worktype
(Currently, this is always painting))
7
10. Description (corresponds to CCOs Description and VRAs
description (a free text essay carefully describing the
imagery of the work))
8
Cheerwine Contemporary Painting Museum
Work Record
Title: Jonah and the Whale (in the Whale)
Artist: Verne Dawson
Measurements: 274.3 254 cm
Materials: Oil on Canvas
Nation: USA
Date: 2009
Current Location: CCPM, on display
Subject: Whale gullet interior
Work Type: Painting
Description: An interior landscape of a Whales innards,

murky black and red arched walls with tiny white dots
scattered like fireflies, and liquid pools of blue, red and
black along the bottom. A hall-like mouth, lined with
teeth, extends down the center, with a blue arch in the
distance representing the distant exterior of the mouth.
9
Work Record
Title: Caspian
Artist: Pia Fries
Measurements: 200 x 260 cm
Materials: Oil and Silkscreen on Wood
Nation: Switzerland
Date: 2001-2002
Subject:
Abstract
Work Type: Painting
Description: A white field with a liquid blue patch

extending down the center from top to bottom, encrusted over
with varicolored tracks of thickly textured, marbled paint
swirling over much of the surface. Greens, yellows, dark
purples and white predominate. A thick yellowish glob in
the upper left corner. About a third of the surface remains
unpainted white; the thick paint resembles a topographic
garden map.
10
Work Record
Title: 100 Years Ago
Artist: Peter Doig
Nation: UK
Date: 2001
Subject: Person in Canoe, Island
Work Type: Painting
Description: An androgynous human with long hair and dark

clothes sits in the middle of a long red canoe that extends
across the length of the painting. Below/before the canoe
is blue/black water with a rippling reflection of the canoe
and rider. Above/behind the canoe is a flat mottled white
wall, above which peeks the top of a small green land mass
with clusters of trees and white paths and structures;
above, a dark blue sky.
11
Work Record
Title: Ash Wednesday: 8.30 am
Artist: George Shaw
Materials: Humbrol enamel on board
Nation: UK
Date: 2004-2005
Subject: Fence, tree, parking lot
Work Type: painting
Description: A scraggly tree on the far right is silhouetted

against a bright yellow sky which takes up the top half of
the canvas. The horizon line is formed by a tightly slatted
fence with shrubbery behind; a distant tower and a distant
tree dimly visible in the distance beyond the fence top.
The lower third of the canvas is covered by a shadowed
parking area with zigzag yellow paint lines, and a sidewalk
against the fence, striped by the sunlight through the fence
slats.
12
Work Record
Title: Jellyfish Eyes Black 3
Artist: Takashi Murakami
Measurements: 50.8 x 50.8 cm
Materials: Mixed media graphic
Nation: Japan
Date: n.a.
Subject: Cartoon eyes
Work Type: Limited print
Description: a swarm of disembodied cartoon eyes against a

black field. Each eye is a circle with multicolored pupils
within pupils. Some eyes are wide open, others are closed;
some are lidded, and some have lashes. Many of the eyes are
linked by enclosing color fields with thin branching
connections.
13
Work Record
Title: La Brea Night
Artist: Carole Benzaken
Materials: Acrylic on Canvas
Nation: Los Angeles
Date: 2002
Subject: city scenes, night and day juxtaposition
Work Type: Painting
Description: A dark field with smeary red-and-blue tinged

white lights, as of city lights through a blurred glass.
Superimposed on this, scattered spherical images of
storefronts and active people in daylight.
14
Work Record
Title: Lovers (Shri Parvatheeveekshanapriyan and Kaushiki

Puramjanam) at playful leisure-The Doctrine of the Forest
(Cuckoonebulopolis)
Artist: Surendran Nair
Nation: India
Date: 2009-2010
Current Location: CCPM, on display, on loan from Rick

Trembles Gallery, Montreal, Ca.
Subject: Lovers, Ungulate, Hindu Imagery
Work Type: Painting
Description: The purple-skinned Hindu goddess Kali jumps on

her husband Shiva, her red tongue curling menacingly.
Meanwhile, a kitten menaces his neatly bandaged leg (perhaps
the lord of destruction has suffered a sports injury) and a
deer looks curiously on.-Source: Jumabhoy, Zehra. Vitamin
P2. London: Phaidon Press Limited, 2011; Page 224.
15
Work Record
Title: Nose
Artist: Amy Sillman
Nation: USA
Date: 2010
Current Location: CCPM, on display, on loan from Sikkema

Jenkins & Co. Gallery, New York.
Subject: Abstract
Work Type: Painting
Description: Abstract multicolored line drawing resembling a

detail from a technical diagram against green, yellow and
blue color fields that correspond closely to the lines but
with some overlap. An orange-outlined trio of gloved
fingers sits in the center of the image, within a roughly
triangular shape with two circles at the lower left tip; the
triangle is suggestive of a nose.
16
Work Record
Title: Undress
Artist: Kristine Moran
Nation: New York
Date: 2009
Subject: Orphic Cubism (Artists term. Source: Enright,

Robert. Vitamin P2. London: Phaidon Press Limited, 2011;
Page 216.)
Work Type: Painting
Description: Thick gestural brushstrokes, light on dark,

suggest a highly abstracted nude human form center-right.
Orchid-like red and green swirl at top center; drape-like
vertical multicolored brushstrokes on left. Thinner
branchlike curling arcs of paint across the foreground left
which balance the suggested figures mass.
17
Work Record
Title: Untitled
Artist: Martin Kobe
Materials: Acrylic on Canvas
Nation: Germany
Date: 2008
Current Location: CCPM Open Storage
Subject: Architecture
Work Type: Painting
Description: A building on the right with railings, screen

doors, ladder and overhang. It is semi-transparent,
resembling a Neo-Cubist interpretation of an architectural
concept drawing. The building is bright orange with shining
white highlights; blue sky visible behind and through the
building.
18
The Cheerwine Contemporary Painting Museum will
only be able to exhibit a portion of its five hundred item
collection in its galleries at any one time.
Regular
rotation of display items will be needed to take full

advantage of the CCPMs holdings.
The current storage space
on the third floor of the Corelab will be open storage, an

approach which is increasingly popular in the museum field7.
This will allow patrons to view items even when they arent
officially on display, so nothing in the collection will go
to waste.
11 Valerie Breuvart, Vitamin P: New Perspectives in Painting

(London:Phaidon Press, 2002)
22 Julia Hasting, Vitamin P2:New Perspectives in Painting

(London:Phaidon Press, 2011)
33 Putting Things in Order: a Directory of Metadata Schemas and

Related Standards, last accessed November 8, 2012,
http://www.jiscdigitalmedia.ac.uk/crossmedia/advice/putting-thingsin-order-links-to-metadata-schemas-and-related-standards.
44 VRA, last accessed November 8, 2012, http://standardscatalogue.ukoln.ac.uk/index/VRA.
55 CDWA, last accessed November 8, 2012, http://standardscatalogue.ukoln.ac.uk/index/CDWA.
66 Cataloging Cultural Objects: A Guide to Describing Cultural Works

and their Images, Online Edition, last accessed November 8, 2012,
http://cco.vrafoundation.org/index.php/toolkit/cco_pdf_version/
77 "Museums as Walk-In Closets; Visible Storage Opens Troves to the

Public." The New York Times. May 8, 2001 Tuesday . Date Accessed:
2012/11/08. http://www.lexisnexis.com/hottopics/lnacademic.

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WHITE PAPER FOR THE CHEERWINE CONTEMPORARY PAINTING MUSEUMS

METADATA AND CATALOGING WORKSHEET

The Cheerwine Contemporary Painting Museum (CCPM),

These paintings need to

be cataloged, and Chief Curator Aaron White searched for a

After some online research he found JISC

Digital Medias directory of Metadata Schemas and Related

Mr. White also consulted the Vitamin P books

themselves to consider the information they provided on each

Each section begins, however, with text.

The artists name is printed first, in bold orange letters.

The individual commentator is

named at the end of the essay.

Beneath this text-block is a

second text-block which begins with the artists birthplace,

Next in the text block comes Selected One Person

Exhibitions by year, name and location of each exhibition,

The last text

before the images is citation of the images themselves. Each

Each section begins with a bio-critical essay,

the other information that, in the first volume, was

Moreover, it will need

a way to encode the complex idiosyncrasies of modern

These works range from abstraction, to

cartoonishness, to lush illustrative styling that the

To reflect this, the metadata standard will

need to allow for nimble descriptions of each works

It seems unlikely that catalog

records without photographic reproductions of the work will

VRA, according to their JISC Standards Catalogue,

VRA Core 4 permits

the linking of catalog entries with images5, and this is a

vocabulary standards that aim most squarely at the museum

Both are well established, but CCPM has

chosen to adopt CCO for the user-friendly clarity of its

Like the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame

up the street, the CCPM will rely on student/intern workers,

4 and CCO are both products of the Visual Resources

Title: Jonah and the Whale (in the Whale)

Artist: Verne Dawson

Measurements: 274.3 254 cm

Materials: Oil on Canvas

Current Location: CCPM, on display

Subject: Whale gullet interior

Work Type: Painting

Description: An interior landscape of a Whales innards,

Artist: Pia Fries

Measurements: 200 x 260 cm

Materials: Oil and Silkscreen on Wood

Current Location: CCPM, on display

Work Type: Painting

Description: A white field with a liquid blue patch

Title: 100 Years Ago

Artist: Peter Doig

Measurements: 240 x 360 cm

Materials: Oil on Canvas

Current Location: CCPM, on display

Subject: Person in Canoe, Island

Work Type: Painting

Description: An androgynous human with long hair and dark

Title: Ash Wednesday: 8.30 am

Artist: George Shaw