IN AN ENCYCLOPEDIC FASHION: BERG FASHION LIBRARY
www.bergpublishers.com

Berg Fashion Library recently went live with a new online (subscription) service that offers research materials for “students, scholars and professionals at the cutting edge of their subject”.

It already contains images from the Victoria & Albert Museum‘s Fashion Collection as well as articles from the Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion.

In 2011 Berg will be adding 2,000 images from the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute Collection. This means a subscriber will have access to viewing over 35,000 pieces dating from the 17th century to the present from Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas–including the Brooklyn Museum’s Costume Collection acquired in 2008.

With the new search tool, you will be able to access “fully cross-searchable” information by time & place or by style. Berg has monthly as well as annual subscriptions–and a free 30-day trial.

REAL & VIRTUAL THREADS@TEXTILE MUSEUM CANADA
www.textilemuseum.ca

The exhibitions page of the Textile Museum of Canada highlights what’s on view there. So far this fall they’ve featured some dazzling shows: 4 temporary exhibits plus 2 shows from their permanent collection. Person Place Thing encompasses 3 of the shows; Faces and Mazes by SDA member Lia Cook, Skin and Bone by David R. Harper and Stumble by Stephen Schofield. Showcasing “tactile, large-scale works,” the portraits in Person Place Thing were on display through October 17, 2010–but it’s worth checking out the archived images. The brilliantly colored and inventive Drawing with Scissors: Molas from Kuna Yala runs through February, 2011.

Most of the web sites I mention here can only give you an inspiring taste of the art work, but the Textile Museum of Canada also has interactive features designed especially for online viewing–and participation. There are 5 items in the right-hand sidebar on the exhibitions page under Online Projects. Each of those has subsections with a featured artist and menu of further activities, including puzzles to solve, textiles to color, and books that you view by turning the pages with your mouse.

My favorite is Digital Threads, where you can “view new dynamic artist projects that link to 50 exhibitions and 17 years of programming at the TMC.” And my favorite item in that section is Nature, The Environment and Weird Materials.

TYLER FIBER BLOG: AN EXCELLENT SOURCE OF FIBER
www.tylerfiber.blogspot.com

The blog for the fiber program at Temple University’s Tyler School of Art is an attractive and seemingly endless source of links to inspiring artists working in just about every fiber technique.

Start with the web sites of faculty, BFA and MFA students found on the right hand side of each page–then check out the web sites of recent graduates. Scroll down to the archived blogs. Although there are some entries specific to the students and current events in Tyler’s Fibers & Material Studies program, the emphasis is on opening doors to an expanse of online ideas through introductions to books, exhibitions and the work of individual fiber artists.

At least once a month (and frequently more often)  there are profiles of great fiber artists. For instance, take a look at an entry last June (2010) for the work of Jim Skull, or the September 1 post that has a link to a fascinating video of Scott Fife’s cardboard sculpture process.

Image at right from the web site of SDA member and Tyler Fibers & Material Studies program faculty Lorraine Glessner. Visit her blog
oh what a world, what a world at www.lorraineglessner.blogspot.com

YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU:
ONLINE LEGACY PLANNING RESOURCES FOR ARTISTS
waand.rutgers.edu/iwa/etched/site/EiM-video-home.html

Etched in Memory: Legacy Planning for Artists is a web resource on how to conserve and safeguard your legacy. It was designed to assist artists with sound planning and archival practices as they build and maintain their artistic reputations and creative output.

Their mission is to provide information so that “Artists can assist their surviving partners, family and friends with decisions on financial issues and estates, as well as the disposition of their personal papers, business records and artwork.”

Some of the resources are the result of a one-day symposium held at the Scholarly Communication Center (SCC) at Alexander Library on the College Avenue Campus of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ, in March 2009. (See SDA NewsBlog article about this issue and event by Patricia Malarcher under Process & Business archive or by searching the tags legacy or estate planning.–Ed.)

Videos of the presentions by artists, archivists, arts professionals and legal experts can be accessed by clicking on the name of the speaker in a menu bar–then clicking on the image of the presenter to load the video. There is also a resource list.

Etched in Memory was presented by Women Artists Archives National Directory (WAAND) and the Institute for Women & Art (IWA) in partnership with the Rutgers University Libraries (RUL) and underwritten by the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a Partner Agency of the National Endowment for the Arts.