Ivy,
There already are decent cataloging rules covering items without formal
titles. Check AACR2. Better for the sort of material you mention,
check APPM (Archives, Personal Papers and Manuscripts by Steve Hensen).
You're not just creating labels but catalog records as well and
apparently want to use the title field to do both. Double duty from a
single field. Hensen offers some very good advice on how this
information should be formatted. Use of brackets is wise, also, to
indicate information is not on item, but has been supplied. A meaning
probably lost to the general public, but hopefully not to cataloging
staff and others at your institution.
Others here suggested lower/uppercase. Why not just follow AACR2/ISBD/etc.
capitalization rules for titles, regardless if they're supplied or not.
Result: consistent presentation of information.
Example: [Robert Jones watercolor, 1934]
Some rules (esp older, non-standard rules) specify to create classified
titles, which can be a real pain and I'd suggest you avoid, if possible.
Example: [Jones, Robert. Paintings. Watercolors. 1934.]
Imagine a patron or staff person trying to make sense of that. Yes, nice
that it's broken down into discreet units, but it's not readily
understandable.
Note, too, that this supplied title field is a good place to bring out
relevant information, not just for the object label, but for the catalog
as well. The catalog title field is important and one of the first places
a user will look to see what's what. This can be customized at the local
level to bring out information relevant to your institution. For example,
if all your paintings are watercolors, you might decide to cut off either
"paintings" or "watercolors." Risky, but some do it that way.
[Sunset Motel room, Las Vegas]
Card catalog user probably has no upfront clue this is a painting. Also,
what if you _do _ get sonething that's not a painting or watercolor?
Typically, you can include such things as: form, medium, date, artist
name, style, etc. You might also want to include keywords here that could
be linked to the item in an online search. Generally, a good idea to
include a few keywords relevant to your clientele, expected use, unique
features, etc.
This brings up another important point about supplied titles you need to
consider: collocation. In other words, consider the order in which the
various entried will be displayed. Not just in a simple catalog of
"paintings," but also perhaps across the museum's
collecting areas (card catalog, published catalog, computer display). Would
you want records arranged in a logical (alphabetical, chronological,
form/medium, etc.) display? A combination of two or more of those
arranging criteria?
[Jones, Robert. Painting, 1934]
[Jones, Robert. Painting, 1948]
[Jones, Robert. Watercolor, 1922]
All this person's titled materials could appear in order first by artist
name, then by actual title. Why not do likewise for the untitled works?
Computer display will also be affected by such things as handling of
initial articles, abbreviations, special non-textual characters (the '['),
diacritics, upper/lower-casing, left to right processing, etc.
For items with no or little information, you can follow the same procedure,
but will need to make a determination if a great number of identical or
nearly identical titles would be a problem. (In some instances it shouldn't,
but some people like to create unique titles for each work.) So, if it
doesn't bother you, you might have a whole slew of:
[Watercolor painting, 1978]
[Watercolor painting, 1978]
[Watercolor painting, 1978]
Or you could differentiate entries slightly:
[Watercolor painting, 1978. Joe Smith collection]
[Watercolor painting, 1978. Jane Doe collection]
Or put the collection name first.
Etc., etc.
Of course, beyond bearing a label, the object would probably also need to
have an accession, inventory, or other id to identify it uniquely.
In summary, there's a wide range of methods for creating supplied
titles, but some careful advance thought given to their construction is
necessary to allow for integration with titled materials. Plus, there's
the advantage of uning the supplied title to bring out additional
information that might otherwise be buried or just not included in the
record. I'd recommend generally following established rules for their
creation, with maybe a bit of adaptation to meet local needs, if needed.
Bottom line, keep supplied titles short, use natural language rather than
classified terms, and make them descriptive. Bottom line, avoid
idiosyncratic methods wherever possible.
Hope this helps.
Henry
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Strickler wrote:
> Here I am again with another plea for help!
>
> 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
>
> "Never forget that life is like a Fellini movie, and you're getting to see
> it for free."
>
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