The Collection
The Hermano José Collection is a very diversified and ample documental fund, with approximately 6,500 documental items composing its museological, archival, and bibliographical collections.
Among the typologies we found are: paintings, engravings and drawings both by Hermano José and other artists; wood carvings; sculptures in noble metals; stained glass; sacred art; popular art; photographs; pocket watches from the early 20th Century; wall clocks; colonial-style furniture; antique coins; shell and fossil collections; sound and phonographic archives such as albums, records and films; historical archives of the local artistic-cultural scene, such as exhibition posters, invitations, letters, newspapers; historical archives of the cultural management in Paraíba, especially of the organs in which Hermano José worked; personal letters to different interlocutors; among many other artistic and natural objects that composed his personal collection.
Besides those already mentioned, its bibliographical collection is composed of about 3000 titles, circumscribed in the areas of Paraíba, Brazilian and foreign literature, visual arts, cinema, performing arts, culture and society; and other humanities, such as philosophy, history, art history, psychology and sexology, besides historical and artistic-cultural encyclopedias, art and exhibition catalogs and specialized dictionaries. In this sense, it is configured as a specialized collection in art, culture and humanities, among which titles of scientific and academic nature and rare books.
Having undergone conservation processes in recent years, in 2021 the MCCHJ will begin the process of cataloging its three collections (museological, archival, and bibliographical). For this, it will become a pioneer in the use of the Acervus platform, a platform dedicated to the cataloging and diffusion of historic, artistic, and cultural collections, developed by the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN) and currently being implemented at UFPB. Soon, the collection will be available for broad access and knowledge of the entire community in digital media.