Indiana University Fine Arts Library Thing

When I interned with the Art Librarian at the University of Minnesota (check out my first post on creating a blog), one of my regular tasks was collection management. Every week I got to go down to technical services to approve the books that arrived through approval plans, and I got to weed through slips and order books from catalogs too. It was always interesting to see the new load. So many beautiful, inspiring art books–and I got first dibs on checking them out. However, I was always a bit unsettled after reviewing or ordering books, knowing that in a couple weeks, after a short stint on the new book shelf, hidden among the other humanities and social science texts, these book treasures would disappear into the ether–aka, the stacks.

Since the art history, fine arts, and performing arts collections at the UofM were all lumped in the main library, it was especially difficult to draw attention to new acquisitions, either physically or online, which was one reason I was asked to start a blog. The architecture and landscape architecture books, however, were luckier, as they had their own library home, and a large new books table on which to be displayed.

In the case of Indiana University-Bloomington‘s Fine Art Library, it is a physically separate library so they can prominently display new books, and they do have their own website where they can also advertise recent arrivals, so that is just what they have done. And they have done it using a web 2.0 tool, Library Thing.

On the library’s homepage there is a link to New Books tag cloud. When you click on it, you are directed to the tag cloud with an introduction notifying you that here you can view up to 200 of the most recent books received by the library in the last few weeks. Currently, Architecture, Exhibitions, Painting, and Photography appear to be the most populated categories. When you click on a category, you are directed to the IU Fine Arts Library’s Library Thing page, where you see a list of all of the titles with that particular tag, as well as the call number for that item. While I had known about it, I had never used Library Thing prior to my discovery of it on the IU Fine Arts Library page. It really is quite intuitive. Entries even link to WorldCat and various citation formats, which is really convenient. If I become a member of Library Thing, I can even add these books to my personal library or wishlist.

I’d say the IU Fine Arts Library’s experiment with Library Thing is a success. While it may be interesting for students to browse, I think it would be especially helpful to art history and architecture professors who study a particular subject, such as Islamic art. They can stay up to date on library acquisitions by just clicking on that category in the tag cloud. It’s also a great way for faculty and students to see what categories are lacking, and they can then request books to suit their needs.

In addition to Library Thing, the IU Fine Arts Library uses reference chat and an Add This widget that allows users to bookmark or share the Library’s website via a number of web 2.0 tools.