Art History
Online Encyclopedias
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Oxford Art OnlineComprehensive online reference resource for all aspects of the visual arts worldwide from prehistory to the 1990s. Includes information on artists, worldwide art, artistic techniques, and other art-related topics.
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Encyclopaedia BritannicaContains the complete encyclopedia, Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary & the Britannica Book of the Year. Includes articles, illustrations, definitions, and links to Web sites selected, rated, and reviewed by Britannica editors.
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Encyclopedia of SemioticsGreat overview of the theory and science of signs, language, and iconography.
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Grove Encyclopedia of Classical Art and ArchitectureEssential guide and handbook to Classical Art and Architecture.
 
Internet Reference Sources
ArtCyclopedia A long-running site with many links to art references, museums, and archives.
Creative Commons This website explains the Creative Common licenses used for images distributed on the internet.
Collecting & Provenance Research The Getty Research Institute (GRI) explains some basics for provenance research on this page.
Getty Research Institute The Getty Research Institute's web page provides many informative links relevant to scholars of art history and museum studies.
Smart History An open-access collection of Art History essays written by current professors.
Timelines of World Art This reference provides a quick method to find and compare different time periods and styles on a global scale.
Witcombe's Art History resources This long-running website provides multiple references for different topics related to Art History.
Writing about Art A useful website explaining the basics of essay writing in art history.
Print Reference Sources
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Principles of Art History Writing by David Carrier
Call number: N380 .C37 1991ISBN: 0271007117Publication date: 1991Principles of Art History Writing traces the changes in the way in which writers about art represent the same works. These differ in such deep ways as to raise the question of whether those at the beginning of the process even saw the same things as those at the end did. Carrier uses four case studies to identify and explain changing styles of restorations and the history of interpretations of selected works by Piero, Caravaggio, and van Eyck. - 
    
A Short Guide to Writing about Art by Sylvan Barnet
Call number: N7476 .B37 2015ISBN: 9780205886999Publication date: 2014The best-selling guide to writing about art Sylvan Barnet's A Short Guide to Writing About Art guides students through every aspect of writing about art. Students are shown how to analyze pictures (drawings, paintings, photographs), sculptures and architecture, and are prepared with the tools they need to present their ideas through effective writing. Coverage of essential writing assignments includes formal analysis, comparison, research paper, review of an exhibition, and essay examination. New to the 11th edition is a chapter on "Virtual Exhibitions: Writing Text Panels and Other Materials." - 
    
Art Books by Wolfgang M. Freitag (Editor)
Call number: N40 .F73x 1997ISBN: 0824033264Publication date: 1997First published in 1997. For this second edition of Art Books: A Basic Bibliography of Monographs on Artists, the vast number of new books published since 1985 was surveyed and evaluated. This has resulted in the selection of 3,395 additional titles. These selections, reflective of the increase in the monographic literature on artists during the last ten years, are evidence of the activities of a larger number of art historians in more countries worldwide, of the increasingly diverse and ambitious exhibition programs of museums whose number has also increased dramatically, and also of a lively international art market and the attendant gallery activities. The selections of the first edition have been reviewed, errors have been corrected and important new editions and reprints have been noted. The second edition contains 278 names of artists not represented in the first edition. - 
    
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Art Information and the Internet by Lois S. Jones
Call number: N59 .J66 1999ISBN: 1573561622Publication date: 1998Sponsored by ARLIS/NA (Art Libraries Society of North America)Lois Swan Jones has updated and expanded the methodology of her 1990 work, ^LArt Information, to reflect the recent explosive growth in electronic resources. In this new work, Jones shows researchers how to locate art information online and how to supplement it with information in other formats to produce the best possible research results. This work describes the methodology and resources that art researchers need to find and use information on the Internet. - 
    
Guide to the Literature of Art History by Max Marmor; Alex Ross
Call number: N380 .M374 2005ISBN: 0838908780Publication date: 2004Helping to reestablish bibliographical control of significant art and architectural literature for the last two decades of the twentieth century, Guide to the Literature of Art History 2 is the authoritative, must-have resource for all art history students, institutions, and agencies. 
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Abstract Expressionist Women Painters by Francoise S. Puniello; Halina R. Rusak
Call number: ND212.5.A25 P86x 1996ISBN: 0810829983Publication date: 1996The first in-depth resource on the American artists Elaine de Kooning, Helen Frankenthaler, Grace Hartigan, Lee Krasner, Joan Mitchell, and Ethel Schwabacher. - 
    
The International Dictionary of Women Workers in the Decorative Arts by Alice Irma Prather-Moses
Call number: HD6069 .P7ISBN: 0810814501Publication date: 1981 - 
    
Women Artists by Sherry Piland
Call number: N8354 .B32x 1994ISBN: 0810825597Publication date: 1995Expanded to include an additional 29 artists, among them the 17th-century painter Josefa de Ayala; the 18th-century portraitist Catherine Read; the 19th-century sculptor Marcello; and the innovative American printmaker Caroline Durieux, the second edition of Women Artists is evidence of the growing interest in the lives and careers of women artists. Additional annotated entries are included for the painters, printmakers, photographers, sculptors, and craftswomen represented in the earlier volume. Because of the amount of information now available on women architects, they are not included in the second edition. The main section of the book consists of 185 individual artist bibliographies, arranged by century from the early middle ages throughout the 20th century, with a cutoff birth date of 1930. A short biographical sketch introduces each artist; most of the bibliographies close with a list of public collections in which examples of the artist's work can be found. Piland treats the general subject of women artists in a bibliography that includes surveys, biographical dictionaries, catalogs, bibliographies, microfilm collections, slide sets, and dissertations. The final section is a selected bibliography on needlework, the traditional art of women. With 43 black-and-white reproductions. From reviews of the first edition, by Donna G. Bachmann & Sherry Piland (1978) "...immensely helpful...the first full-length bibliography in English that treats only women artists...providential..." --CHOICE "...recommended..." --LIBRARY JOURNAL - 
    
North American Women Artists of the Twentieth Century by Jules Heller (Editor); Nancy G. Heller (Editor)
Call number: N6503 .N67 1995ISBN: 0824060490Publication date: 1995A reference source for biographical information on women artists from Canada, Mexico, and the USA. The 1,500 entries cover those artists that were born before 1960, and who have worked in a wide range of arts from painting and sculpture to performance art. - 
    
Dictionary of Women Artists by Delia Gaze (Editor)
Call number: N8354 .D53 1997ISBN: 1884964214Publication date: 1997First Published in 1997. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company. - 
    
A Biographical Dictionary of Women Artists in Europe and America since 1850 by Penny Dunford
Call number: N6757 .D86 1990bISBN: 0812282302Publication date: 1990 - 
    
Women Artists in the U. S. by Paula Chiarmonte
Call number: N 6536 .W65x 1990ISBN: 9780816189175Publication date: 1990 - 
    
Women in the Fine Arts by Janet A. Anderson
Call number: N8354 .A63x 1991ISBN: 0899505414Publication date: 1991Many women artists throughout history have generated a brilliant heritage that has been suppressed and left inaccessible for scholarly or public appreciation and study. This book provides a remedy by making available literary references to women artists' lives and social milieu and, more importantly, citing illustrations of their work for serious study.Most of the references are drawn from unindexed sources in books, periodicals, exhibition catalogs and newspapers, accompanied by an illustration guide that directs the reader to specific pictures for further study. Subjects include architects, painters and sculptors since the Renaissance, photographers, recent artists in performance, video and computer fields, and related areas of feminist aesthetics. References are annotated if they represent a major (or only) work of the artist in question. 
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Latin American Women Artists, Kahlo and Look Who Else by Cecilia Puerto
Call number: N6502.5 .P84x 1996ISBN: 0313289344Publication date: 1996This volume is a unique contribution to Latin American studies because it underscores the essential role that women have played in the arenas of modern and contemporary art. [This book] provides valuable and much-needed assistance to the researcher. (From the foreword by Elizabeth Ferrer) With more than 1,500 references on nearly 800 women Latin American Women Artists, Kahlo and Look Who Else pays tribute to the rich and multifaceted artistic accomplishments of women in and from 20th-century Latin America. Frida Kahlo has until recently dominated the interest of scholars, curators, and the public to the point of almost eclipsing the achievements of other artists from the region. This selectively annotated bibliography begins systematically to identify other women -- painters, sculptors, printmakers, photographers, performance artists, and others -- who have made significant contributions to the history of art in the region. The first section, the main part of the work, consists of individual artists grouped in an alphabetical country arrangement. Artists in each country are listed A-Z, as are the citations about them. Annotations are descriptive and highlight, among other details, the presence of biographical and professional development information in the analyzed materials. A section of general works arranged by country follows, consisting principally of periodical and monographic literature that deals with numerous women, and a listing of the women mentioned in the cited materials. The volume has two appendices. The first is an analyzed list of 77 collective exhibitions in which works by these women have been presented. The second appendix groups the artists by country, allowing for an in-brief look at all of the artists identified in the bibliography. The name index references artists to the main section by country code and also includes entries for authors, curators, and exhibition catalogue essayists. - 
    
Contemporary Latin American Artists by Annick Sanjurjo (Editor); José Gómez-Sicre (Foreword by); José Gómez-Sicre (Foreword by)
Call number: N6502.5 .C659 1997ISBN: 9780810832817Publication date: 1997Sanjuro's long-awaited companion volume to Contemporary Latin American Artists contains information on those internationally known artists who exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art of Latin America in the Organization of American States headquarters in Washington, D.C. from 1941-1964. Together, the two volumes of the set record approximately 750 exhibitions including more than 2,000 artists, and cover exhibitions at the OAS from 1941-1985. Arranged in chronological order, the second volume includes works exhibited and curricula vitae where available. A list of works exhibited has been added when it was missing from the original catalogue, others have been corrected in accordance with the list used during the exhibition. To facilitate the use of this volume, an index of artists provides the names of exhibitors in alphabetical order, followed by dates of birth and death, media used, and dates of exhibition. Also included are an index of exhibitions by country, index by country, and appendix. - 
    
Contemporary Latin American Artists by Annick Sanjurjo (Editor); Jose Gomez-Sicre (Foreword by)
Call number: N6502.5 .C66 1993ISBN: 0810826445Publication date: 1993...this book really shines, though is in offering access to biographical information on artists generally unknown to North Americans...an excellent reference book for research collections. --LIBRARY JOURNAL ... This monumental effort gives a good history of the development of modern Latin American art. --CHOICE ...Sanjurjo has gone a long way in redressing the neglect in the literature of a continent and a culture's artistic achievements... --ART DOCUMENTATION - 
    
Modern Latin American Art by James A. Findlay
Call number: N6502.5 .F56xISBN: 0313237573Publication date: 1983 
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The Biographical Directory of Native American Painters by Patrick D. Lester (Editor)
Call number: N6536 .L47x 1995ISBN: 0806199369Publication date: 1995 - 
    
The Native American Indian Artist Directory by Robert Painter
Call number: N6538.A4 P3x 1998ISBN: 0966880609Publication date: 1999 
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The Black Artist in America by Dennis Thomison
Call number: N6538.N5 T46 1991ISBN: 0810825031Publication date: 1993Helps the user identify African-American artists and locate published reproductions of their work, ranging from the colonial period to the present. - 
    
St. James Guide to Black Artists by Thomas Riggs
Call number: N40 .S78 1997ISBN: 1558622209Publication date: 1997Profiles 400 prominent 20th-century artists. African American artists make up 75 per cent of the entries, while artists from the Caribbean, Africa and around the world complete this volume. A limited number of influential masters from the 19th century are represented. The guide covers artists working in visual arts, including painting, sculpture, printmaking and photography. Each descriptive entry provides: a concise biography; lists of both individual and group exhibitions; a listing of public galleries and museums that have the work of the entrant in their permanent collection; a bibliography of books and articles by and about the entrant; and a critical evaluation. A photograph of the artist and/or his or her work often accompanies the entry. Comments from the artists themselves regarding their work or the art precede the contributor's essay. - 
    
Two Hundred Fifty Years of Afro-American Art by Lynn M. Igoe; James Igoe
Call number: N6538.N5 I36xISBN: 0835213765Publication date: 1981