Spencer Museum of Art

Purpose: Sustaining Cultural Heritage The Spencer Museum of Art at the University of Kansas has a collection of 24,450 works of art in all media, primarily from the United States, Europe, and Asia-an exceptionally large and diverse collection for a university art museum. Only about 500 of these works are on public view at any one time. The more fragile works are displayed rarely. As a teaching museum, the Spencer uses its collections to educate and enhance the lives of university students and the general public through a wide range of programs, exhibitions, and classes. In this project, the museum will complete the digital photographic documentation of its collection and enter the images into its state-of-the-art collections management database. The museum will edit and correct existing metadata in the database. The information will be made available to museum visitors via a computer terminal with public access and to university students, faculty, and staff through the University's Digital Library System. By the end of the two-year grant period, images of all objects in the museum's collection will be available through the Digital Library. In addition, the collection will be shared universally through the museum's Web site.