
Happy National Library Week! National Library Week is sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA) and celebrated in all types of libraries across the country every year. The 2023 theme is “There is More to the Story” and is an opportunity for libraries to promote all the varied stories, formats, roles, and ways that stories are shared and created in the library. This week, we will share the Engl library and archive story and tell you more about what makes this library unique.
Engl Library & Archive - A Museum Library The Michael S. Engl Family Foundation Library and Archive opened in 2001 as part of the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum Research Center to principally support the Museum’s curatorial staff’s research needs and the annual academic fellowship program. As a single artist museum, the focused area of study was and remains Georgia O’Keeffe and her contemporaries, related regional histories, and Modernism. Over the years the library has grown and changed, and is now open to all by appointment Monday – Friday year-round.
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Initially, museum libraries were conceived to support documentation and research of the collections owned by the museum and served the museum staff. Museum staff are still the primary audience of many museum libraries today. Museums found that a library could serve an integral role in expanding knowledge of the collection since they could only physically collect a limited number of objects, and through the library books and resources many more types of objects could be understood and an expanded context could be explored.
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Museum libraries often manage and provide access to collections not only as information resources but as unique cultural objects. These objects may be exhibited and cared for as special collections. The Engl library and archive collections include artists’ books, art monographs, exhibition catalogs, art journals, manuscripts, institutional records, photographs, vertical and artist files, just to name a few types of materials.
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Staff working in museum libraries wear many hats and are trained to support special subject research, copyright research, and advise on information management. In the digital age we serve a broader role, not only supporting physical collection access and care but also creation, preservation, and management of digital objects and information. By developing and hosting public programs and curating exhibitions, we dive into and share rich content often prompted by audience interest. For example, inquiries about O’Keeffe’s quotes and writing was motivation for the current library exhibition Georgia O’Keeffe: Finding Words and we regularly deliver updates about cataloging and preserving O’Keeffe’s personal library, a favorite resource of patrons, through social media and public talks.
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Please stay tuned as we celebrate library week and share the story of the Engl library!
Learn more
- About the Engl Library - More information about the services and collections at the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum library and archive
- The New Art Museum Library - Recently updated book about art museum libraries
- Art Libraries Society of North America - ARLIS/NA is a professional organization promoting supporting architecture and art librarians, visual resources professionals, artists, curators, educators, publishers, students, and others throughout North America interested in visual arts information