Good ol’ federal government! Every museum would like to archive its documents in digital form, but few would pay extra to make them publicly accessible, or translate them for diverse audiences. The Dallas Museum of Art has received a $85,000 from the National Endowment for the Arts to fund the Access to Archival Exhibition Resources Online (AAERO) project, which aims to put ten years worth of DMA documents online. A new publicly accessible website featuring installation images, wall labels, or program recordings. The project will also support Spanish translation of some exhibition brochures and transcripts of artist talks.
Progress continues on the DMA’s Exhibition Catalogs Online (ECO) project, another NEA grant–funded initiative to digitize DMA catalogs and checklists from 1903 to 1983. Access to the materials will begin this summer when approximately 300 publications will be available through the Portal to Texas History created by the University of North Texas.
“The AAERO project will create a centralized gateway for researchers, both the public and museum staff, to access exhibition information that currently exists in several storage locations,” added Hillary Bober, Digital Archivist at the DMA. “By creating this template, the digital archives will be able to make available for immediate use thousands of installation images, recorded lectures, press and marketing materials, and much more, generating a complete picture of an exhibition at the DMA.” The Museum’s Digital Archives is an endowed program funded in 2008 with gifts from the Dedman Foundation and an anonymous donor.
