Thursday 14th AM: Caroline Simpson Library
Reflection
The Caroline Simpson Library & Research Collection is located in the old Mint building in Macquarie Street in the heart of Sydney. The library developed out of the need to support the work of Sydney Living Museums and the management of a range of culturally significant locations in NSW including places like Vaucluse House, Elizabeth Bay House, Meroogal, Rose Seidler House and a number of other important locations. This library is open to the general public and offers services to anyone with an interest in the history of house and garden design and interior furnishing in NSW. This library is a specialist research resource for scholars, heritage and conservation practitioners, museum professionals, designers and tertiary students.
Caroline Simpson Library has some very particular challenges. It is located in an historic building which dictates certain aspects of its architectural design and conservation of links to the past uses of the site. It has a vast array of items beyond a collection of books and it therefore requires staff with curation experience across a wide range of objects. Being shown how these objects are stored and displayed was most informative and stimulates interest in how libraries can be utilised to provide storage and access to much more than just books.
The power of the REAL artefacts was clearly evident in this collection. We were shown the connection between elements of the collection and the provision of historical evidence of the uses of those elements in the daily life of NSW.
Another theme emerged here – the impact of the librarian’s particular skill set and expertise in establishing both the ongoing collection of items and forging new facets of interest in aspects of life that this collection can house. The international reputation of the library is currently enhanced by the Research Librarian’s, Matthew Stephens, interest in the domestic history of music in Australia.

Thursday 14th PM: Art Gallery of NSW
Reflection
The Edmund and Joanna Capon Research Library at the Art Gallery of NSW has supported the artistic life of NSW since 1874. It is the oldest continuous fine arts library in Australia. It purchases for both education and also to support the work purchased by the Art Gallery. The library was originally a practicing teaching and studio space.
Administratively the library is under the Collections division of the gallery. The gallery’s core function is the collection – conservation supports that function – the library supports conservation.
The library also has ambitions of being the National Art Archive and has been the first to appoint an Indigenous Archivist.
This library has a small team of 5 librarians who do a bit of everything. The librarians do a lot of archiving to support their role as members of gallery staff. The library is an asset of the gallery’s collection and is valued every 3 years.
The collection is still very print based and includes books, journals, exhibition catalogues, a huge ephemera collection and artists’ files dating back to the 19th century. This library also houses a large audio visual collection being transferred to digital formats. There is a huge amount of work to be done to attach metadata to the catalogue and finalise their collection development policy – an evolving document.
“A reference library needs to hold onto things” – so this library has storage challenges just as all the libraries we attended during these visits. However, the library does not provide lending services but does email research solutions.
This library has a very clear message – the librarians here have an obvious interest and passion for the art in the collection and the artists who utilise the services provided here. They combine their own interests and skills sets to support research and also teach the research skills needed.