Collections management

Collections management involves the development, storage, and preservation of cultural property, as well as objects of contemporary culture (including contemporary art, literature, technology, and documents) in museums, libraries, archives and private collections. The primary goal of collections management is to meet the needs of the individual collector or collecting institution's mission statement, while also ensuring the long-term safety and sustainability of the cultural objects within the collector's care. Collections management, which consists primarily of the administrative responsibilities associated with collection development, is closely related to collections care, which is the physical preservation of cultural heritage. The professionals most influenced by collections management include collection managers, registrars, and archivists.

Definition

Cultural property collections require a great deal of care and protection in order to ensure their safety from external loss or damage, but they also require in-depth documentation to assist in tracking the life of the object within the holding institution. To accommodate these needs, collectors adhere to collections management and collections care standards and practices, which serve to create a safe environment for collection objects with clear and precise accompanying documentation. Where collections care addresses the physical actions necessary to prevent or delay damages of cultural heritage, collection management can be defined as "a process of information gathering, communication, coordination, policy formulation, evaluation, and planning." These processes influence decisions about records management and the collections management policy, which outlines protocols for the collection scope, collections care, and emergency planning and response.

Collections management systems

Collection management systems (CMS) are software programs designed to aid in the archiving and cataloging of objects in a collection. Within libraries, archives, and museums. Although every CMS program is unique, there are several features that are considered standard:

Cataloging: This feature includes fields for object identification purposes such as permanent identification numbers, object name, artist or creator name, object description, dimensions, object components and materials, condition, provenance, exhibition and preservation history, current location, and an image of the object.