CDWA

CDWA, or Categories for the Description of Works of Art, is a metadata content model used by museums and other cultural heritage repositories to describe works of art and related objects. It provides a structured set of descriptive categories and elements to support consistent cataloging and data exchange, with an emphasis on detailed documentation that supports discovery in digital catalogs and across institutions. CDWA is designed as a framework rather than a single serialization, and is commonly implemented using XML schemas such as CDWA-XML or the simplified CDWA Lite.

CDWA was developed in the 1990s by a consortium of professional organizations including the Visual Resources Association (VRA), the College Art Association (CAA), and ARLIS/NA, with support from the Getty Information Institute. The standard was published in 1998 to promote interoperability among museum catalogs and digital records. Since then, it has evolved through the CDWA Lite and CDWA-XML encodings and ongoing refinement of vocabularies, linked data approaches, and mapping to other metadata schemes.

CDWA defines categories and elements to describe identification, object names, date and place of creation, materials and techniques, measurements, inscription, provenance, bibliographic references, display and rights, and relationships to related works. The model emphasizes the use of controlled vocabularies for certain elements, enabling consistent tagging of media, creators, and periods.

CDWA records can be mapped to MARC, Dublin Core, and other standards, facilitating data exchange among libraries, archives, and museums. The CDWA family includes CDWA-XML for detailed descriptions and CDWA Lite for simpler implementations.

As a foundational framework in art information management, CDWA has influenced subsequent metadata schemas and cataloging practices, and remains relevant for institutions seeking rich, interoperable descriptions of art objects and related materials.