---
title: "Cultural asset mapping"
description: "Systematically identifying and cataloging a community’s cultural resources (artworks, venues, organizations, traditions) so they can be planned for and shared."
glossary: "https://www.civiccollection.com/glossary"
source: "https://www.civiccollection.com/glossary/cultural-asset-mapping"
---

# Cultural asset mapping

> Systematically identifying and cataloging a community’s cultural resources (artworks, venues, organizations, traditions) so they can be planned for and shared.

Glossary: https://www.civiccollection.com/glossary  
Source: https://www.civiccollection.com/glossary/cultural-asset-mapping

For public art, the mapping exercise is almost always revelatory: works
appear that no department currently owns on paper, works listed in the
inventory turn out to be missing or damaged, and whole districts turn out to
have nothing at all. The map is a mirror: it shows a city where it has
actually invested, as opposed to where it believes it has.

An asset map earns its cost only if it stays alive. Published as an open
dataset or a [public map](https://www.civiccollection.com/interactive-map), it becomes infrastructure other
people build on; filed as a PDF appendix to a plan, it starts going stale
the day it's delivered.

Related terms: [Collection management](https://www.civiccollection.com/glossary/collection-management), [Cultural plan](https://www.civiccollection.com/glossary/cultural-plan), [Open civic data](https://www.civiccollection.com/glossary/open-civic-data)

## Mentioned in

- [From Open Data to a Living Guide](https://www.civiccollection.com/blog/from-open-data-to-a-living-guide)