Fine and Decorative Arts 

Not sure where to start? Ask the art librarian:

tom.mcnulty@nyu.edu

General Databases

These are the most widely-used databases for finding articles in journals, chapters in books, and other materials of interest to the art researcher. More specialized databases are found in the box below.

• ArtBibliographies Modern, 1974-Present.
  
  Excellent starting point for research in 19th and 20th century art, architecture, and design. Provides indexing to periodicals, books, exhibition catalogs and dissertations from 1984 to the present. Articles are abstracted from 500 major international art, photography and design journals and museum bulletins. Abstracts of articles in foreign journals are provided in English.
• Art Full Text, 1984-Present. New York: H. W. Wilson.
  Art Index Retrospective, 1929-1984. New York: H. W. Wilson.
  
  Provides citations to articles and book reviews published in more than 450 periodicals, yearbooks, and museum bulletins in all fields related to the arts including archaeology, architecture, art history, city planning, industrial design, interior design, and landscape design. International coverage.
• Bibliography of the History of Art, 1973-Present.
  
  BHA abstracts books, periodicals, exhibition catalogs and dissertations relating to post-classical European and Post Columbian American art.

Specialized Databases

• AATA Online Abstracts of International Conservation Literature. Includes the contents of all 36 volumes of Art and Archaeology Technical Abstracts and its predecessor, IIC Abstracts, as well as over 1,500 abstracts published between 1932 and 1955 by the Fogg Art Museum and the Freer Gallery of Art. Currently updated on a quarterly basis.
• ArtNet. Art Market News and auction prices. Price database available on-site in Bobst Library only.
• Avery index to Architectural Periodicals 1977 to present. Citations to articles from more than 1,000 periodicals in all Western languages, including all major architectural journals published in the U.S. and Great Britain, as well as most South American, European and Japanese architecture-related periodicals.
• Dissertations. (Proquest Digital). Citations dating from 1861 tothe present. Many records dating from the last few decades available full-text. Others via interlibrary loan.
• FRANCIS. Multidiciplinary database covering the humanities, art, architecture, and related fields.
• Grove Dictionary of Art Online. The Grove Dictionary of Art contains 45,000 articles on every aspect of the visual arts: painting, sculpture, graphic arts, architecture, decorative arts and photography - from prehistory to the present day. Compiled over a period of 15 years, it represents the work of more than 6,800 scholars around the world, each writing on his or her own specialist field of study. Includes the Bridgeman art library, 35,000 images of painting, sculpture, architecture and the decorative arts.
• Index of Christian Art. Thematic and iconographic index of early Christian and medieval art objects.
• Index to Nineteenth Century American Art Periodicals
  The only online index to art periodicals that were published in the United States during the 19th Century. Since entire journal contents are indexed--articles, art notes, illustrations, stories, poems, and advertisements-- the index is a valuable source of information on popular culture and industry, as well as artists and illustrators, painting, sculpture, drawing, photography, architecture and design, exhibitions and sales, decoration, and collecting.
• SCIPIO (Sales Catalog Index Project Input On-line): late 16th c. to present
  ontains bibliographic records for art sales catalogs owned by the libraries of eight major museums (including the Metropolitan Museum of Art). Includes paintings, sculpture, drawings, prints, photographs, furniture and decorative arts, jewelry and objets d'art.