Elaine and myself took ourselves off to the big smoke last week on the 2nd of October to visit Courtauld Institue of Art. This was a good opportunity to meet one of the stakeholders in the creative assembly face to face to discuss what the XCRI-CAP project has meant for them as a specialist art institute.
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We met with Tom Scutt who showed us around their impressive gallery, steeped in history where I was delighted and amazed to see an original Van Gogh.
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The imposing grounds were arresting and it was easy to see how inspiring the surroundings must be for their students.
Where old meets new, what struck me was the juxtaposition of traditional and modern. For example, Courtauld are making every effort to digitalise their extensive archives, which hold a wealth of data collected over the life of the institute. With the same economic issues facing them as other institutions, having seen the collection, I very much hope that the archive can be stored in some way.
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| Where old meets new, a state of the art library in an old converted wine cellar |
Courtauld decided to use a web CMS to create a framework from which to build their XCRI-CAP feed. To achieve this Drupal was chosen and have since released their XCRI-CAP module to the public. I have had the opportunity to look at this and found it a very useful tool for those institutions using Drupal. The module allows users to create a catalogue of course presentations that adhere to the XCRI standard and can be set up on an existing Drupal installation in minutes.
On reflection, it was apparent how Courtauld and PCA both complimented and 'filled in the gaps'. I am excited at what this could mean for future relations both between us and Courtauld and the rest of the creative assembly.
Tom has found the interaction between institutes both in the project as a whole and the creative assembly stimulating and useful and shall also be hosting the next creative assembly meeting in November.
