Project Archivist, UPP Arts, Providence, RI
Posted June 5, 2017
INTRODUCTION
2017 marks the 10th year of UPP Arts engaging artists and the community in public art-making for the purpose of celebrating and building stewardship of our shared natural environment. We are made up of a revolving group of volunteer artists, scientists, educators and concerned citizens who are all interested in collaborating to promote the health of our urban ponds. We facilitate workshops for all ages, primarily in local schools, in which participants learn about the ponds’ history and environmental/health issues while making creative props for an annual celebratory procession to raise further awareness and advocate for the ponds’ clean-up, both building community and improving the environment. We are excited to celebrate this incredible decade of innovative arts education and grassroots civic engagement by compiling stories of the lessons learned over the past 10 years, sharing them with the public and making them accessible to generations to come. In June, we will begin the UPP Arts Legacy Project, a 2-year endeavor in which founder and director Holly Ewald will work with an archivist to collect and organize UPP’s physical and digital archives to be presented to the Providence Public Library’s Rhode Island Collection. This publicly accessible archive will show how UPP Arts developed as an organization and the activities it undertook, benefiting artists, environmental organizations, government agencies and community groups interested in engaging artists to effect social and environmental change. The archiving process will enable Ewald to reflect on the past 10 years as she prepares to encapsulate the UPP Arts story and approach in a collaborative book, with contributions from UPP’s many diverse partners including government agencies, academic researchers, teaching artists, students and residents.
GENERAL STATEMENT OF DUTIES
UPP Arts seeks to hire an experienced project archivist to assist with processing its organizational archives. The collection documents the ten year history of this active and creative public humanities organization. The UPP Arts archives includes a mix of physical and born-digital records. The project archivist will select and organize UPP materials for the archive including: website, documentary photographs, documentary and student project videos, grant reports, newspaper articles, digital projects Rhode Tour and Mashapaug Neighbors, organization minutes/notes, formal papers, education packets, published articles and self published book and research materials, with links to the oral histories and research papers produced by Brown University students during their course work. Successful performance requires well developed interpersonal and writing skills, the ability to attain an in-depth knowledge of the collection, experience working with both physical and born-digital records, adherence to archival standards and an attention to detail. The UPP Arts project archivist is a temporary position. This position reports to the Director of UPP Arts and will work in consultation with the Providence Public Library Curator of Rhode Island Collections.
KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS AND ABILITIES
- Knowledge of archival processing and preservation best practices. Including: o Ability to both formulate high level plans and provide attention to detail
- Adherence to DACS, LCSH, and Getty AAT
- Understanding of metadata standards including Dublin Core, METS and MODS
- Demonstrated knowledge of digital file formats, file management and related preservation standards.
- Ability to communicate clearly both orally and in writing.
- Ability to establish and maintain effective partnerships with colleagues and grant project advisors.
EXPERIENCE AND TRAINING
- MLS or equivalent degree from an ALA accredited institution with experience as a professional archivist.
SCHEDULE AND COMPENSATION
- Hourly rate of $20/hour
- July-October 2017 for a total of 100 hours for the course of the project.
Preferred schedule one day a week; specific schedule to be determined in consultation with Director of UPP Arts.
Application deadline: June 19, 2017
Submit to: [email protected]