Collection Files

This series comprises information about collectors and collections, mostly in the United Kingdom. The material includes:

-correspondence

-black and white photographs of works of art

-images of works of art from publications

-summary descriptions of research

-research notes

-newspaper cuttings

-annotated publications and extracts from publications

-annotated sale catalogues, including extracts and copies

-other material such as lists of pictures, valuations for insurance purposes, and summaries of sales

The following was carried out during the cataloguing process:

-the material held at the Centre was merged with that acquired from The Barber Institute of Fine Arts and arranged into an alphabetical sequence of collector and collection names. These were assigned by Simpson and no attempt has been made to update them

-Simpson retained information about individual collectors, families, collections, country houses and galleries in separate files. These have been amalgamated where relevant.

-where it has been possible to confirm the identity of individuals, their full names and known life span have been given. This information has been taken from the records themselves, the Virtual International Authority File (VIAF), and Wikipedia.

-duplicate material in the files held at the Centre and acquired from The Barber Institute of Fine Art has been removed

Many of the collectors and collections may have a single item or very few records relating to them, and these have been catalogued in miscellaneous files under the name of the individual/family, or property. Those collectors and collections for which there are more than six pages of material have been catalogued as separate files, and the content has been described in detail.

All unannotated, original and complete house guides and auction catalogues relating to a particular collection have been removed from the archive and added to the Centre's Library collection.

Open for research. Readers must fill in an 'Reader Agreement Form' which outlines the reading room rules and conditions concerning privacy and Data Protection

Whilst working at the Centre, Simpson established a series of Collection Files which were held as part of the Library collection until 2021. This material included publications, extracts from publications (original and photocopy), photographs, notes, cuttings and correspondence. Although much of this dates to the 1970s, and was therefore created and compiled by Simpson and other members of staff at the Centre, a significant amount of material originated from M. Knoedler & Co. As it is assumed Simpson retained this when he left their employment because of its subject matter nd then integrated it with his newer research, no attempt has been made to move it to the sub-collection relating to the company's records (FHS/3).

In 2013, the Centre acquired material from The Barber Institute of Fine Art which had been created and compiled by Simpson. Included amongst it was a sequence of A4 brown envelopes, also containing his research on collections. Although Simpson was employed there between 1945-1958, some of the material was created after this period and it is not known why the Barber had it. As there was a similarity in content between this and the Centre's Library Collection Files, it was decided during the process of cataloguing in 2021 to integrate the two sequences and include it in the archive.