To create MARC records for the physical sculptures of Rogers’ “Nydia, the Blind Flower Girl of Pompeii” and “Ruth Gleaning”, the “ArtMARC Sourcebook: Cataloging Art, Architecture, and Their Visual Images” was used (McRae & White, 1998). The book addressed the cataloging of sculptures and provided an outstanding example of the essential MARC fields for recording the Rogers sculptures. After “Nydia” was created, the same standards were used to complete a MARC record for ‘Ruth Gleaning.”
I went through every MARC field to correlate the information with the data provided by the Met’s catalog record for the work. MARC fields for conservation and condition reporting such as 596, 597-599 were not utilized in recording the Rogers sculptures because this type of data was not provided by the Met. I found that the information made available on the Met website was fairly basic for most casual users. The Met may have recorded conservation and condition recording data in their original record, but there was no mention of the length to which object was vetted.
Leaving those MARC fields out of the picture, I was able to create most of the other MARC fields for “Nydia” by following the MARC example in the sourcebook. I did note a few changes in how the catalog data was coded in MARC. Field 530 was an opportunity to point towards a less conventional representation of the actual sculpture. I noted the object image on file but I also decided to use the Met’s 3D scan and object as an “illustration” of the original sculpture. The original language of this guideline suggests that the illustration is a “published reproduction” (McRae & White, 1998). This makes sense for an illustration, but I wanted to use this field for the 3D scan and model. The working group dug a bit deeper and revealed that the 3D scan is actually an adaptation according to RDA section, 6.27.1.5 Adaptations and Revisions; the 3D scan “substantially changes the nature and content of that work” (RDA Toolkit, 2010). Given this information, I would suggest the guideline for MARC field 530 be changed to include published reproductions or adaptations.
One last area of change and decision-making was in the MARC fields, 650 for subjects and 655 for object types. The latter informed the change of subject headings for the 650 field. 655 requires the object type to be validated by a controlled vocabulary such as Getty AAT or LCTGM. This resulted in choosing “sculpture (visual work)” for the object type. I decided that this naming authority should be reflected in the subject headings as well, despite what the Met posted in the original catalog record. As a result, I chose sculpture (visual work) and marble (rock) from the Getty AAT.
-Jennifer Ann Peters