The Corcoran Library of the Corcoran Gallery and College of Art + Design announces the launch of the Corcoran Archival Network for the Visual Arts (CANVAS).

CANVAS, built on CONTENTdm, will serve as the Corcoran Library’s digital collections platform. These collections will highlight the Corcoran’s contributions to local, national, and international artistic and academic communities. In the future, appropriate collections will be synchronized with WorldCat and their local library catalog, making their digital collections more visible and discoverable to the world. 

Initial priority has been given to the Corcoran College of Art + Design’s Graduate Theses Collection. The Graduate Theses Collection showcases original research accomplished by graduate students at the Corcoran College of Art + Design. They have loaded about 80% of the theses, and will continue to add items on a regular basis. The second priority is to develop a Corcoran Library Image Collection, shaped directly from student and faculty image needs, that will complement subscriptions to image databases. Full-text access to theses and full size image access are restricted to the Corcoran's two Washington, DC campuses.

Future collections will both support the learning, teaching, and research goals of students, faculty, and staff, and highlight the Corcoran’s contributions to the art world. Projects under consideration include documentation of undergraduate senior theses, a digital collection catalog of the library’s artists’ books, and the Corcoran Biennial catalogs.

CANVAS can be accessed at http://canvas.corcoran.edu, http://canvas.corcoran.org, and through a forthcoming Digital Collections navigation link on the Corcoran Library website.