Theatre 254: Costume I
Picture Research: Sources & Methods
Spring 2008 - Kiki Smith
Reference Contact: Barbara Polowy x2941

Print Sources | Licensed Collections| Internet Searching & Sources | Citing Images

PRINT SOURCES: IMAGE SEARCHING IN BOOKS & PERIODICALS

Library Collections

Five College Library Catalog
is useful to find illustrations in books and catalogs. Helpful subheadings for finding heavily illustrated publications are:
-- Exhibitions | -- In art | -- Illustrations | -- Photographs | -- Portraits

Location of Art Library Materials
is a browsing guide to the subject arrangement of the books, catalogs, and other resources in Hillyer Art Library.

Illustrated Popular Periodicals

Architecture & Interior Decoration Magazines
Arts & Decoration. 1910-1942. Art Periodical N1 .A845
House Beautiful. 1897-2001. Art Periodical NA7100 .H65

Fashion Magazines
Harper’s Bazaar. 1867-1998. Art Periodical TT500. H3
Vogue. 1950- . Sophia Smith Collection uncataloged

General Interest & News Magazines
Colliers. 1895-1957. Neilson Periodicals AP2 .C65
Life. 1930-1972. Neilson Periodicals AP2 .L547
Saturday Evening Post. 1921- . Neilson Periodicals AP2 .S2

Women's Magazines
Good Housekeeping. 1888-1992. Sophia Smith Collection
The Ladies’ Home Journal. 1892-1992. Sophia Smith Collection.
McCall’s. 1950-2001. Sophia Smith Collection.

Digitized Historical Newspapers

New York Times (1851-2002)
Los Angeles Times (1881-1986)
Washington Post (1877 to 1991)
The Times (London) (1785-1985)

Illustration Indexes

Indexes to specific images in well-illustrated popular periodicals like American Heritage, Smithsonian, National Geographic, and other titles.

Art Reference N7525 .I558 and Neilson Reference N7525 .I558
Illustration Index. 2nd ed., 1950-June 1963; 3rd ed., July 1963-1971; 4th
ed., 1972-1976; 5th ed., 1977-1981; 6th ed., 1982-1986; 7th ed., 1987-1991; 8th ed., 1992-1996. New York : Scarecrow Press, 1957-1998.

LICENSED IMAGE RESOURCES

Major Image Databases

ARTstor
A library of 500,000 digital images of works of art and other cultural materials. Images range from standard art history survey material to specialized collections documenting (for example) the design and architecture collections of New York's Museum of Modern Art, women's history, and Native American art and culture.

INSIGHT
The Luna Imaging INSIGHT database provides access to over 150,000 images including digital images including numerous objects from Smith's Historic Clothing Collection, Mortimer Rare Book Room, and Museum of Art, as well as images used for teaching and study on the Smith campus. Members of the Smith community should contact Jacy Birdsong (x3105) to set up an Insight account.

Other Subscription Databases with Significant Image Content

AccuNet/AP Multimedia Archive
Covers 1984s to the present. Current year's photos from the Associated Press photo library and over a million photos dating from the 1840s to the present with text captions.

Dictionary of National Biography
10,000 portraits in all media are included in this standard reference source for British biography (no living subjects are included). Images can be searched by sitter, artist, date. Biographies also includes lists of other portraits of the subject.

Groveart.com
This comprehensive encyclopedia of art provides links to 150,000 digital images from The Bridgeman Art Library, Art Resource, from museum and other art websites.

Index of Christian Art
Documents 60,000 works of art in all media produced from apostolic times through the 15th century with Christian themes or for ecclesiastical settings. Entries give bibliographies and images (over 120,000 are included in the database).

IMAGES ON THE INTERNET: SEARCHING & SOURCES

Thomas, Ruth S. Finding Images on the Web. Boston University Libraries. Created September 1998, last updated December 2006.

Image Search Engines

A Review of Image Search Engines. Technical Advisory Service for Images. May 2006.
Evaluation of major search engines with image search options as well as specilized image search engines. Includes links to many image sites.

AltaVista Image Search
Google Image Search
OAIster
Academically oriented digital resources harvested from educational and research institutions, national libraries, and other organizations. Select "limit by resource type: image"
Picsearch
Yahoo Image Search (select Images tab)

Public Collections

Collect Britain. British Library.
More than 90,000 digital images of maps, prints and drawings, photographs, and other documents, and rare early sound recordings from around the globe.

American Memory. Library of Congress.
A "gateway to rich primary source materials relating to the history and culture of the United States. The site offers more than 7 million digital items from more than 100 historical collections." Use the Collection Finder to access the collection by broad subject, date, place, or material format.

Gallica. Bibliotheque National de France.
Over 80,000 digital images of photographs, prints, drawings, maps, manuscripts, books, and other materials documenting the history and culture of France.

NYPL Digital. New York Public Library.
"NYPL Digital Gallery provides access to over 600,000 images digitized from primary sources and printed rarities in the collections of The New York Public Library, including illuminated manuscripts, historical maps, vintage posters, rare prints and photographs, illustrated books, printed ephemera, and more." (now includes the Picture Collection Online)

Picture Australia. National Library of Australia.
Search engine for Australia-related images of "people, places and events in the collections of libraries, museums, galleries, archives, universities and other cultural agencies, in Australia and abroad." Includes works of art in all media, contemporary news and historical photos, historical objects and printed materials.

Visual Arts Data Service. Arts and Humanities Data Service, Kings College.
Includes several fashion and textiles collections among its 100,000 images including the London College of Fashion (paper patterns, Cordwainers Shoe Collection, the Woolmark Company, a collection of garment photos), The Textiles Collection: University College for the Creative Arts at Farnham, and Central Saint Martins: Museum & Study Collection.

Photo Agencies & Other Commercial Sites

Corbis
Corbis offers a preeminent collection of more than 100 million creative, entertainment and historic images, a comprehensive footage library."

Conde Nast Store
Includes covers and editorial illustrations, browsable by decades from Vanity Fair, Vogue, House & Garden, Mademoiselle, GQ, and other Conde Nast publications.

Getty Images
New York Times. Photos & Graphics
Time-Life Pictures

CITING IMAGES

Style Manuals & Citation Guides. Smith College Libraries.
Includes a section on citing images of works of art and photographic illustrations.

HELP FROM A LIBRARIAN

Barbara Polowy, Head of the Hillyer Art Library, 121 Hillyer Hall

COMMENTS & QUESTIONS

Click here to provide feedback on this library session and follow up with any questions about topics covered in the class.

Return to Top

Home | Research | Library Services | General Information | Smith Libraries & Collections | Need Help?