Visual Arts Librarian
Finding images on the Web
Copyright restrictions may apply to images found online. Many museums have excellent web sites that display images from their collections, as well as information about the images, and contacts for more assistance. These sites can be a good starting point, and the library also has many lavishly illustrated catalogs available for research as well.
- ArtsyArtsy’s database includes more than 100,000 works of art from museums and galleries around the world. Artsy offers an encyclopedic collection of world art, and one of the largest collections of modern and contemporary art freely accessible on the web. In addition, 33,000 high resolution, open access images in our database are available for download.
- Audubon's Birds of America at the University of PittsburghThe University of Pittsburgh presents the complete double elephant folio set of Audubon’s Birds of America, accompanied by his Ornithological Biography, through this Web site.
- Beazley ArchiveThe Beazley Archive is a research unit of the University of Oxford's Faculty of Literae Humaniores. This web site provides access to photographs, notes, drawings and books relating to ancient Greek and Roman art.
- British MuseumIn the collections of the British Museum the world can write the new histories that it needs to understand its past and shape its future.
- Getty ImagesRoyalty free images for purchase
- The Getty Search GatewayThe Getty Search Gateway allows users to search across several of the Getty repositories, including collections databases, library catalogs, collection inventories, and archival finding aids.
- Google Arts & CultureExplore museums from around the world, discover and view hundreds of artworks at incredible zoom levels, and even create and share your own collection of masterpieces.
- Gray's AnatomyThe Bartleby.com edition of Gray’s Anatomy of the Human Body features 1,247 vibrant engravings—many in color—from the classic 1918 publication, as well as a subject index with 13,000 entries ranging from the Antrum of Highmore to the Zonule of Zinn.
- Library of Congress Free to Use Image SetsThese sets are just a small sample of the Library's digital collections that are free to use and reuse. The digital collections comprise millions of items including books, newspapers, manuscripts, prints and photos, maps, musical scores, films, sound recordings and more.
- Louvre MuseumThe Musee du Louvre houses 35,000 works of art drawn from eight departments, displayed in over 60,000 square meters of exhibition space dedicated to the permanent collections. Explore the works on display, taking a thematic or cross-departmental approach.
- Metropolitan Museum of ArtThe Metropolitan Museum's collection now contains more than two million works of art from all points of the compass, ancient through modern times. About 6,500 objects highlights from each of the Museum's curatorial departments can be accessed online.
- Museum of Fine Arts BostonWith a collection of 450,000 objects, the MFA owns some of the most rare and important artistic treasures in the world.
- National Gallery of ArtThe National Gallery of Art houses one of the finest collections in the world. More than 5,600 objects from the collection are available online.
- National Geographic PhotographyNational Geographic's online photo galleries
- New Deal/WPA Art ProjectOn May 6, 1935, the Works Progress Administration (W.P.A.) was created to help provide economic relief to the citizens of the United States who were suffering through the Great Depression.
- New York Public Library Picture Collection OnlineThe Picture Collection Online is an image resource site for those who seek knowledge and inspiration from visual materials. It is a collection of 30,000 digitized images from books, magazines and newspapers as well as original photographs, prints and postcards, mostly created before 1923.
- Public Art ArchiveThe Public Art Archive™ (www.PublicArtArchive.org™) is both a project and “The Archive™” database. The PAA project is a national effort to increase public awareness and stewardship of public artworks, including “The Archive” database, a Tumblr blog titled “Find, Know, and Grow Your Public Art”, at http://publicartarchive.tumblr.com/, various educational initiatives and local community engagement efforts. “The Archive” database is a free, online and mobile accessible catalog of completed public artworks worldwide. It was launched in 2009 and continues to grow both in content and features.
- Ryerson & Burnham Archival Image & Media CollectionThe Ryerson & Burnham Archives collect artists' and architects' papers that complement and extend the permanent collections of the museum's curatorial departments. The Archives' collections are notably strong in late 19th- and 20th-century American architecture, with particular depth in Midwest, Chicago School, Prairie School and organic architecture. Architects such as Edward Bennett, Daniel Burnham, Bruce Goff, Bertrand Goldberg, Ludwig Hilberseimer, Mies van der Rohe, Louis Sullivan, and Frank Lloyd Wright and events such as the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893 and the 1933 Century of Progress International Exposition are represented in a broad range of graphic and textual records. The Archives also collect the papers of artists, designers and scholars such as Ivan Albright, Irving Penn, André Mellerio, and Richard Ten Eyck.
- Smithsonian InstitutionSearch over 9.0 million catalog records of museum objects, and library & archives materials. More than 1,085,000 of these records contain online images, video and sound files, electronic journals and other online resources.
- VADS: the online resource for visual artsThe Visual Arts Data Service (VADS) has built up a considerable portfolio of visual art collections comprising over 100,000 images that are freely available and copyright cleared for use in learning, teaching and research in the UK.
- Victoria & Albert Museum CollectionsSearch 1,159,094 objects and 464,231 images
from the V&A's collections - Vistas:Visual Culture in Spanish America, 1520-1820The Vistas project seeks to bring an understanding of the visual culture of Spanish America to a broad audience.
- Web Gallery of ArtA virtual museum and searchable database of European painting and sculpture of the Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Neoclassicism and Romanticism periods (1100-1850), currently containing over 19.300 reproductions.
- Winterthur Digital CollectionThe Winterthur Museum in Wilmington, Delaware is one of the premier museums of American material culture, located in the childhood home of industrialist and collector Henry Francis du Pont (1880-1969). For those unable to visit in person, the Winterthur Digital Collection includes detailed records, many accompanied by images, for the majority of the approximately 90,000 collection objects - including ceramics, furniture, glass, prints, paintings, metalwork, and textiles, most dating from about 1600 to 1860.