Inventory
blacksquare keeps each work’s availability, location, documents, price and relationships in one shared record, so the gallery always knows what it has and what has happened around it.
The working record
Every artwork travels with more than a title, artist and image. It has a location, condition, status, price, documents, exhibition history and a changing set of people around it. The gallery needs that context when it prepares a viewing, answers a price request, allocates works to a fair or hands a record to a colleague.
When inventory lives in one tool, contact history in another and fair notes in a spreadsheet, the team has to reconstruct the answer before it can act. That reassembly is easy to miss on a calm day. It becomes costly when a work is reserved, a collector is waiting and the person who knows the details is out of the room.
blacksquare treats the work as a connected record. Its inventory information remains beside the people, events and documents that give the information meaning. The result is a gallery record that can explain itself, rather than a collection of fields that only one person knows how to interpret.
Availability
A work can be available, under offer, reserved, on loan, in transit or committed to an exhibition. Those are different states with different consequences. blacksquare keeps the present status clear, while retaining the activity that led there, so the next person looking at the work can move it forward without guessing.
Location and documents
Dimensions, locations, condition notes, price lists and PDFs should be part of the record, not a separate hunt through shared drives and old messages. When the gallery needs to prepare a shipment, a viewing or an insurance request, the materials remain connected to the work they describe.
Connected history
A good inventory answer often begins with a relationship. Which collectors saw this work at a fair? Which available works are connected to a particular advisor? What happened after a price was requested? These are everyday gallery questions, but they do not fit neatly into a single-table search.
blacksquare records an interaction alongside the work, person and event involved. A price request, PDF, viewing or fair conversation becomes useful history instead of an isolated note. The gallery can build a follow-up list from what actually happened and see the context behind a record without depending on an inbox search.
See it on your own records →Fair work
A fair compresses ordinary gallery operations into a few fast days. Works are selected, moved, reserved and discussed. Prices are requested. Visitors become conversations that need a considered follow-up. The gallery needs to know which work is where, who saw it and what was promised, without making a separate version of the inventory for every event.
In blacksquare, a fair is connected to its allocation of works, checklist, guests and activity. The work record stays current as the fair develops, and the record of the event stays useful after it ends. Instead of copying availability into a temporary spreadsheet, the gallery can work from one history that continues through the season.
This is equally helpful for openings, exhibitions, loans and consignments. The point is not to turn every event into administration. It is to leave the gallery with a clear record of what happened, so a colleague can answer a question later without starting from zero.
Permissions
A registrar may need complete access to dimensions, location and documents. A freelancer may need a fair list. A junior colleague may need enough information to prepare a proposal. None of those roles automatically requires price visibility or every commercial note. blacksquare separates work access from price access so permissions can follow real responsibility.
Collector relationships
A collector may also be an advisor, lender, guest or consignor. Keeping those roles in one contact record prevents duplicate names and makes the relationship legible. When a work becomes available or a fair follow-up is due, the gallery can see the relevant people without rebuilding the connection from old correspondence.
Moving inventory
A change in inventory software should not force the gallery to decide which parts of its past are worth keeping. blacksquare reads every column in an Artlogic export, including information that does not yet have a dedicated place. Those unfamiliar fields remain with the record they came from instead of disappearing into a side file.
Imports use existing source IDs, so the team can rehearse a move, correct the source and import again without creating a second set of works or contacts. This makes it possible to check representative records before relying on the system day to day. It also means the gallery can take its time with the exceptions that matter.
The way out remains clear too. The gallery chooses columns, reads the rows and exports a CSV itself whenever it needs one. Inventory should stay useful to the gallery, rather than becoming difficult to recover because a relationship with a provider changes.
See how an Artlogic export moves →Frequently asked questions
Yes. A work record can hold availability, location, price, documents and the people and events connected to it, so the detail behind a decision stays with the work.
Yes. Work access and price access are separate permissions, allowing the gallery to give each colleague or collaborator the view their role requires.
Yes. blacksquare reads the columns in an Artlogic export and keeps unfamiliar fields with their source record. Imports use existing record IDs, so a second import updates the same record rather than duplicating it.
Yes. The gallery chooses the columns, reads the rows on screen and takes a CSV whenever it needs one.
Walkthrough
See how blacksquare holds works, collector relationships and fair activity in one connected history.
Book a demo