Creating and linking Party records

Creating and linking Party records

Items within your collection will have linked “Parties”. A “Party” refers to a person or organisation that has been involved in the life of an Item. For example, a book’s linked Parties may be the author, editor, publisher, and illustrator. When cataloguing this item, you would need to link each of these respective Parties to the Item record via its Provenance Section.

All Parties which have been linked to your Item records are saved as 'Party records' in the Parties catalogue. This catalogue is not your main collection located in your Item records catalogue. Rather, the Party records exist in support of your main catalogue.


Creating a Party record:
There are two ways you can create a Party record:
  1. While creating or editing an Item record, or
  2. From the Party records catalogue

Creating a new Party record while creating or editing an Item record:
  1. While in 'Update' mode, navigate to the Provenance Section for your Item record
  2. Click Add Creator under Parties associated with creation, or click Add Party if adding a Provenance event
  3. Select 'New record' above the search bar
  4. Add the associated name and details for the individual or organisation
  5. Once complete, click Save at the top right
  6. From the 'Role' drop-down menu, select and appropriate role for this Party

InfoSaving your new Party from within an Item record will automatically link it to the Item you are working on. The Party will now be an existing Party in your Party records and can be linked to other records during future cataloguing.

Creating a new Party record within the Parties Catalogue:
  1. To navigate to your Parties catalogue, click 'Parties' in the 'Catalogue' tile on the Dashboard. You can also navigate to the Parties catalogue via the left-hand sidebar. Click the horizontal lines  at the top left of the screen to access the side bar, then click on 'Catalogue > Parties'.
  2. On the left-hand sidebar, click New Record
  3. Add the associated name and details for the individual or organisation in the Details section 
  4. Once complete, click Save at the top right-hand corner
  5. Follow the steps below to search for and link this new Party record to an Item record

Linking a Party record:
  1. While in 'Update' mode, navigate to the Provenance Section for your Item record
  2. Click Add Creator under Parties associated with creation, or click Add Party if adding a Provenance event
  3. Select 'Existing record' above the search bar
  4. Type in the name of the individual or organisation you would like to link to your Item record and hit 'Enter' on your keyboard
  5. Find the Party name in the search results, and select the Party using the check-box to the right of the name
  6. Click OK at the top right
  7. From the 'Role' drop-down menu, select and appropriate role for this Party
  8. To link another Party record to your Item record, repeat this process
InfoIf your Party doesn’t appear during a search, try searching part of the name only (such as a Surname), or searching known or possible alternate spellings or variations. Alternatively, with your cursor in the search bar and nothing typed into it, hit ‘Enter’ on your keyboard to view all of your Party records.

Still have questions? Leave a comment.

    • Related Articles

    • Managing Party records

      This article explores advanced functionality relating to Party records. If you have never worked with Parties before, we recommend you refer to our article ‘Creating and linking Party records’ to learn more about Parties. When working within the ...

    • Video: conducting a complex or advanced search

      The following is a video tutorial on how to conduct an advanced search of your catalogue within the Victorian Collections CMS:

    • VC Cataloguing Manual

      The Victorian Collection Cataloguing Manual can be accessed by clicking on and downloading the relevant files below. The segments of the manual are: Cataloguing Object Collections Cataloguing Artwork Collections Cataloguing Publication Collections ...

    • Selecting an appropriate record category

      Victorian Collections users care for diverse collections, sometimes even cross-disciplinary collections. You may be a social history museum with public record archives, an art gallery that also holds a local heritage object collestion, or an RSL with ...

    • Modifying member permissions

      Each member of your organisation might choose to use your Victorian Collections page for different reasons: cataloguing, research, answering enquiries, interpretive content, and so on. You may therefore need to provide your users with different ...