My Public Art Portal: The Online Presentation of Washington’s State Art Collection

Washington’s State Art Collection began in 1974 as a percent-for-art public art program and is managed by the Washington State Arts Commission (ArtsWA). Over 4,600 artworks now comprise this collection, which are located at public schools, colleges, universities, and state agencies across Washington State. With designated funding, My Public Art Portal was launched in 2015 as the online presentation of artworks in Washington’s State Art Collection. Valerie Peterman joined ArtsWA in the spring of 2016 as the dedicated web content writer and researcher. In this role she scrubs artwork data, edits publication quality images, and writes interpretive and biographical content about the artists and artworks. The publication of the collection has progressed at the rate of about 100 artworks per month, and the entire collection is scheduled to be online by June 2019. This presentation will focus on preparing and presenting an online collection of public artworks, and the specific challenges that arise working with a publically-funded collection that is so geographically widespread.