General Information
Originally founded about 1940 to support the faculty and students of the Department of Art and Art History, the Visual Resources Collection (VRC) is the latest addition to the University of Texas Libraries. With two main elements—slides and digital images—the VRC offers high-quality images for classroom and research use.
The Visual Resources Collection has been producing digital TIFF images since 2004. As of September 2008, around 33,400 digital JPEG images are accessible via the Digital Archive SErvices (DASE), a password-protected site operated by the College of Liberal Arts.
The VRC also participated in the licensing of the Archivision (Art and Architecture) Collection and the Allan T. Kohl Archive. Both of these collections are accessible through DASE. In cooperation with the Blanton Museum, the VRC is in the process of making the museum's holdings digitally accessible via DASE.
The Slide Collection currently numbers approximately 550,000 35mm analog slides of which about 220,000 have been cataloged. Access to the database of catalog records is available on-site only.
The Collection also houses the Ferguson Collection of over 5000 photographs, negatives, and contact sheets of Mayan sites in Central America.
