The background to this issue of the ALJ begins with the ARLIS International Conference at Sussex University in 1976. For a number of years Judy Hoffberg, at that time Executive Secretary of ARLIS/NA, had been envisaging the formation of an international art libraries organisation and this Conference gave interested librarians from a number of different countries the opportunity to discuss the matter. A decision was made to form a committee of international representatives appointed by the various national groups to formulate the structure of ARLIS/International. This committee was to report its findings within one year.

The first meeting of a new section of IFLA, the Art Libraries Section, was held at the IFLA Conference in Brussels on 8th September, 1977. This was the outcome of several years’ work, both in various different countries and within IFLA itself.

It was at the 39th IFLA Conference (Grenoble, August 1973) that I first suggested to a Special Libraries Division meeting the benefits for IFLA of establishing a group within which art libraries could effectively co-operate. This idea made slow progress, and we had had to arrive at a point where art libraries throughout the world were on the verge of setting up an International Association of Art Libraries, independent of IFLA, before the Special Libraries Division decided to pursue their well justified request.

Definitions are offered of the terms ‘fine arts’ and ‘special libraries’. The scope and organisation of fine art libraries are described, followed by a history of the growth of art library societies in various countries, and the movement towards international co-operation. Art libraries are demonstrated to be a suitable category to constitute a new Section in the Special Libraries Division of IFLA.

(The text of a paper presented at the Special Libraries Division Program Meeting of IFLA in Brussels, 8 September, 1977.)

Definitions are suggested of the nature and role of the special library, and reasons outlined for the need for international cooperation. In particular it is suggested that the heterogeneous formats and wide subject fields embraced in art literature inevitably compel libraries to seek co-operation. Parallel developments in the field of music literature are mentioned. In conclusion the moves towards art library co-operation started in 1976 are seen as exemplifying the dual role that special libraries can play both through subject expertise and by virtue of their contribution to international librarianship.

Acknowledgements are due to Trevor Fawcett, University of East Anglia Library, who kindly allowed the writer to draw on material published in a report presented to the British Library, Research and Development Department, and also from certain articles written by him.

As the first of what is intended to be a regular column devoted to recently published exhibition catalogues, the present list includes catalogues of exhibitions which closed some months ago. Future editions will aim at greater currency (in as far as a deadline two months prior to publication will allow), and will at least give priority to catalogues appearing in the three months between issues.

The primary aim of the column is to draw attention to catalogues which might otherwise escape notice, and to provide a brief description of those catalogues which are less accessible, and difficult to assess before purchasing. Consequently many important catalogues from major exhibiting organisations will be omitted, and the bias inevitably will be towards catalogues from foreign sources.

If, however, you the reader feel that there is a need for evaluative reviewing of certain more readily accessible catalogues as an aid to selection, please make your views known. In addition, the compiler would be very pleased to be notified of catalogues for inclusion in this column, particularly those of provincial exhibitions which sometimes escape national notice, and of which the art librarian on the spot is likely to be aware.

This series will be concerned with giving details of more esoteric art publications that are unlikely to be found in provincial bookshops but are nevertheless of interest to a wide variety of librarians.