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Originally Posted by David R
Speaking from personal experience ( one month data inputting the Littlecote collection for the RA) there is something of dislocation between the knowledgeable and the administration at the museum. This is also a huge collection, many of the labels went on a very long time ago, up to a century and a half in some cases, and it will be a long time before anyone gets round to changing them. The Littlecote collection was acquired more than 20 years before I was given the job of putting it on their computer database. they have a huge collection, they are doing their best at a time of falling budgets and a lack of interest from the the presiding authority.
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David, the Met has many dubious descriptions also, I am willing to bet that both institutions have not even tried very hard to find help or solve this problem. The images that they have of the items held in their collections are valuable resources, I am pointing out that they can not be trusted as far as descriptions go, many people assume that these famous museums are infallible but they are really not doing a very good job in making the items they hold available to the public.
Many people can not travel to these museums and the online images are the only way they have to gain access to what is in them, other people base their visits to these museums on what they know in advance that they will see, it is in their best interest to figure out how to speed up the process, there are many ways to do this such as with students via an intern program.