Establishing an Open-Access MFA Thesis Collection

Abstract

Open-access MFA theses give students the opportunity to publish and establish their work in the public sphere. While providing visibility and preservation of their work, they also serve as a resource for future scholars and their university communities. This article documents the process of working with the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts’ Graduate School of Art at Washington University in St. Louis to disseminate and archive its written MFA theses and related files. Even with an established institutional repository, special considerations for visual art theses must be addressed, including image copyright and privacy and creative concerns. In addition to the team effort on campus, the Art Libraries Society of North America (ARLIS/NA) community responses to a survey proved instrumental when approaching the school and developing an initial plan. [This article is an expansion of a paper presented at the ARLIS/NA conference held in New York, New York, in February 2018.]