We deal with a lot of posters, which also are untitled.  We have established
a set of rules for consistently titling things; we then devise a title for
untitled objects, and append a "Title devised by cataloger" note.  This
works well for us, but may be specific to the material we deal with (popular
music-related stuff).  It allows us to put some recognizable information in
the title field, for the reason you have identified (computer-generated
labels, and title searches).
What do other people out there think of this?

Jim Fricke
Experience Music Project
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We are working on a new computerized catalog and have hit a new hitch. I am
including a layout which will take some of the fields from the "catalog
card" and use them to produce labels for the objects, which will look
something like this:
        Title (or name of object)
        Provenance and date
        Acc. #
        Donor & Date of donation

The problem comes with paintings and prints for which we have little
information and no formal title. Do we say "Untitled" or is that in itself
a kind of title within the art community? Do we say "Title Unknown"? Six or
eight of those in a row could get pretty funny. Do we say "Watercolor",
etc.? Any suggestions here?
Ivy Fleck Strickler                     Phone 215-895-1637
Drexel University                       Fax 215-895-4917
Nesbitt College of Design Arts          [log in to unmask]
Philadelphia, PA 19104